For Her Favor
by Captainraychill
Summary: "If your loyalties change, send me the ribbon, and I will come to you. Until then, we are enemies."
1. Prologue

**This story was originally written for the Valentine's Fic and Art Fest for the DramioneLove community on Livejournal dot com.**

**It was inspired by the 1864 painting, _Meeting on the Turret Stairs, _by Irish painter, Sir Frederick Burton. Please find it online; it's beautiful. The quotes introducing each part are rules from _The Art of Courtly Love, Book Two: On the Rules of Love_ written by Andreas Cappellanus in approximately 1174-1186 A.D. I've taken liberty with Half Blood Prince Quidditch match dates for plot purposes. I've also made Gryffindor Tower the tallest in Hogwarts. Thank you to my wonderful beta and friend, UnseenLibrarian! Also, thank you, Dormiensa, for Patronus assistance. **

**Warnings:** angst, sexual content, explicit language and some wildly romantic notions

**Disclaimer: **"Harry Potter" is the property of J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros. This work of fiction was created entirely for fun, not for profit, and no copyright infringement is intended.

* * *

**FOR HER FAVOR**

_**A man in love is always apprehensive. **_

* * *

He stood on the topmost balcony of the tallest tower of an enchanted Scottish castle. The whipping strands of his white-blond hair illustrated the February wind. An eagle owl was perched on his shoulder.

If you were brave and foolish, as he now imagined he might be for the very first time in his life, you would move to the edge of this small balcony, defy the creaking danger of old wood and rusty iron and stand on the top of the world.

He took a step forward.

Before him were mountains, the gray winter sky and a lake crystallized with ice. His cheeks and ears were pink, and he shivered despite his winter robes and scarf.

He looked down at the charmed ribbon coiled around his gloved fingers. It changed colors, a lustrous gleam shifting from red to gold. He resisted the urge to smell it, knowing its scent had faded long ago. He whispered an incantation, and a thread of black ink twisted from the tip of his wand, scrawling three words on the silk.

He'd given up everything. Now he had to know if that decision, worthy as it was, would bring him some measure of happiness.

He spoke a woman's name as he held the ribbon out for the owl. It stared at his hand with brilliant yellow-orange eyes before grabbing the silk with its beak. He felt the brush of feathers against his face as it flew into the sky to deliver his valentine.

* * *

**To be continued...**

**Reviews are welcomed.**


	2. Chapter One

**Chapter One**

**A true lover is constantly and without intermission possessed by the thought of his beloved.****  
**

* * *

_My name is Helena Ravenclaw, and I write so that I do not break the rhythm of the shuttling days, so that I do not forget a day and, therefore, lose a century to indulgent melancholy._

_It is Friday, the 8__th__ day of November, 1996, according to their calendar._

_I witnessed an unusual kiss today, in the turret stairs. _

_It began as an argument between the intelligent one and the one who searches for a hidden thing. The intelligent one is the girl with untamed, brown hair. She should have been sorted into my House but was not. She is a Gryffindor and good friends with the remarkable one. I do not know her name, nor do I know the name of the one who searches for a hidden thing. He is the boy with white hair and fine robes. He is arrogant and cruel. He belongs to the cursed House of Slytherin and has no true friends. _

_That two such as these, from enemy houses, were arguing – such a common occurrence would be unworthy of ink. However, as I watched and listened to them fight about _sport_, of all things (Kwidatch, I believe it is named) the girl put her hand on the boy's arm, and everything changed._

_I am made of vapor and can feel subtle shifts in the air. I feel when autumn turns into winter in an afternoon. I can sense rain coming over the mountains. I know when a bird's wings beat in the Owlery. Without the consolation of these sensations approximating touch, ghosts would run mad with deprivation. _

_As the boy gazed at the girl's slim hand on his black sleeve, I felt the acceleration of his breathing. I sensed heat in him, the fever of one sick. He looked into her eyes and passed his fever to her. Her breathing quickened, too, and I saw her cheeks blush pink with blood. He whispered a word that sounded like _stranger_ before he leaned down and kissed her._

_They were still at first. Their lips touched but didn't move. Their eyes were closed, and breath moved between their mouths. Then the girl's fingers flexed on his arm. She made a small sound in her throat and gently bit his bottom lip. The intimacy drew a gasp from the boy. In the next moment, he was kissing her fiercely, encircling her in his arms. _

_There was grace and savagery in the way their lips moved, a sort of slow devouring. I couldn't stop staring, although I knew it was improper. I noticed her fingers gripping his white collar, his palm pressing too low on the sway of her back. _

_Their lips and tongues began to form words between kisses. I couldn't hear what they said, but I didn't dare move any closer._

* * *

"Meet me tomorrow an hour before the game. Here," Draco whispered against Hermione's mouth. "Give me your favor, and I'll play."

She laughed. "You're insane if you think I'm going to... give myself to you just to convince you to play Quidditch."

"Poor Granger, can't stop thinking about sex when you're near me, can you?"

"Oh, shut up." Her protest ended with a moan as he deepened their kiss. They didn't speak for several minutes.

"By favor," he finally said breathlessly, "I mean a ribbon or handkerchief, some token of yours for me to wear during the game as a sign of your _favor_. It's an old Quidditch tradition."

"It's an old Muggle tradition, too. About eight hundred years old."

"Pure-bloods uphold important traditions. And beautiful ones," he added, pulling away just enough to gaze down at her face. His fingertips swept upward along the fine lines of her cheekbones until they delved into her hair. She shut her eyes and bit her lip, holding a long silence. When she spoke again, her voice trembled.

"As you have so eloquently stated, I'm not a pure-blood. But I am a Gryffindor, and I would never cheer for Slytherin. It would be a betrayal."

"Don't cheer for Slytherin then. Just cheer for me. In secret." His lips touched hers again with a pressure as soft as silk on skin. He claimed a kiss every three or four words, as if a full sentence were too long to wait. "Meet me here… an hour before the game… or I won't play. I'll walk the halls… unattended… sure to make progress... on this secret mission... you're so certain... I've been given."

"Malfoy." She pulled away, pressing her hands against his hard chest.

"Those are my terms, Granger."

She opened her mouth to refuse, but he silenced her with another passionate kiss, pressing her body close to his. She held still in his arms, but he didn't relent, seducing her with the bold stroke of his tongue against hers. When his fingers touched her hair again, she gripped his shoulders and kissed him back.

* * *

_I know from bitter experience how quickly love can transform into hate. I remember my killer's cries, his flashing knife, my blood staining the moss of the forest floor. I grew so cold. I wonder now if there is a similar alchemy that can transform hate into love. I think it must be possible because that boy had proven himself to be a most vicious creature, time and time again, yet when he kissed the girl and touched her hair... I have never seen a more loving or gentle caress in all my long existence._

_The tenderness of their embrace somehow pierced the place inside me where a heart had once beaten. I felt a phantom rush of blood and yearning. When I'd lived, I had longed for love and never known it. Overwhelmed, I turned away. _

_As I floated through the wall, unseen, I wondered if this was their first kiss or if they had shared other kisses in the narrow stone coil of the turret stairs. Would they meet again? Were they secret lovers?_

_My name is Helena Ravenclaw, and I write so that I do not break the rhythm of the shuttling days, so that I do not forget a day and, therefore, lose a century to indulgent melancholy._

* * *

Hermione lay on her curtained bed, as restless as a ticking clock. She held a ribbon in her hand. It was too dark to see its enchanted silk shift from red to gold. She wore it in her hair at every Quidditch match with Gryffindor pride, a loyal lion through and through. She would _never_ cheer for Slytherin House or its Seeker. But she did believe Voldemort had given Draco Malfoy a secret mission. She could see the fear in his gray eyes, the anxiety in his hands as they moved nervously over his books and parchment before holding unnaturally still. She'd been suspicious since the incident with Katie Bell last month. If she could deter him, distract him – wouldn't that be good? Perhaps she could even convince him to defect. Wouldn't that make her reckless choices wise?

She closed her eyes and brushed the ribbon against her lips. She felt the soft silk grow hotter when it turned red. She remembered Draco's kisses, demanding and seductive, and felt a luscious ache between her thighs. This was arousal like she'd never known before. She'd been infatuated with Ron for years, but he'd never inspired feelings like this. Viktor's kisses had been chaste in comparison to Draco's, barely bringing a flush to her cheeks. Now, every inch of her skin blushed with tempting heat. She kicked off her velvet duvetand cast a Silencing spell. The ribbon lay forgotten, nestled like a little snake on her pillow, as she slipped her fingers inside her cotton knickers.

* * *

Draco didn't have time for this, but he couldn't think about anyone or anything but her. He was on his knees in the Room of Hidden Things. The Vanishing Cabinet loomed above him, dark and enigmatic. He cast his jacket aside and rolled the cuffs of his white shirt above his wrists. Then he reached for the buttons of his trousers.

What right had Granger to be so soft in his arms, to smell so good? What right had she to kiss him so sweetly? He'd never felt so… transported by a simple kiss before. She was a Mudblood. He should loathe her, but this hot energy in his blood definitely wasn't hate. It was a shocking infatuation he couldn't afford. The opal necklace had been a spectacular failure. The Cabinet's damage, its magic and mechanics, were more complex than he could ever have imagined. The days were darkening. Time was running out with every beat of his heart. The world was spinning madly on an axis of epic change, and he was obsessed with a girl.

Would Hermione meet him in the turret stairs tomorrow? Would she give him her favor? If she did, he would fly for _her_, and he would win.

Among the towers of lost and abandoned things in the Room, he glimpsed the corner of a bed he'd never noticed before. He ignored it, remaining on his knees as he reached into his pants and grabbed his hard cock. He thought of Hermione as he stroked himself – remembering the heat of her skin, the sound of her breathless gasps. He thrust into the tight vise of his fist until his brow beaded with sweat and his hips shuddered out of control. When he came, he cried out her name, the word echoing against the vaulted ceiling.

* * *

**A new love puts to flight an old one.**

_It is Saturday, the 9__th__ day of November, 1996, according to their calendar._

_I haunted the turret stairs today, hoping to see them again. _

_The turret juts off Gryffindor Tower, and its stairs ultimately lead up to a lonely, little balcony with no seeming purpose but to gaze out over the western mountains. Though narrow, they are more often used as an alternate path between the sixth floor and the seventh floor, which houses the Gryffindor Common Room and the Room of Hidden Things. _

_The one who searches for a hidden thing arrived first, alone. He was dressed for Kwiditch in green robes with silver stripes down the sleeves. He held a sleek, black broom in one gloved hand. The air around him boiled with his restive agitation. When a crowd of Gryffindors trooped down the stair, a loud as crows, the boy conjured a little, white pipe (called a sigurette) and pretended to smoke. They insulted him, and he sneered at them. But when he saw the intelligent one appear around the coil of the staircase, I felt his sharp intake of breath. The smoke burned his lungs and made him cough._

"_Vile habit, Malfoy," she said. "Especially for a so-called athlete."_

"_Piss off, Granger."_

_Such shamefully course language, but now I knew their names._

_Granger lifted her chin as she passed Malfoy, wearing her gray wool coat and red beret as regally as a queen's embroidered robes. The stairs were so narrow that they almost touched. Two others followed her, including the remarkable one, and then Malfoy was alone again. Breathing hard, he leaned back against the center wall of the turret, which was hardly more than a pillar. He hadn't noticed the ribbon Granger had dropped at his feet. _

_I felt a strange urge to melt out of the stone, to materialize before him and tell him to look down. What if he didn't notice it? With a murmured spell, the sigurette in his hand flared with yellow fire and burned away. When he gazed down at the powdery ash, he saw the ribbon. He leaned down, picked it up and stared at it as if it were a legendary ruby. Its silky color changed from the red to gold. He pressed it against his lips and took a deep breath. _

_I closed my eyes, out of ancient habit, and concentrated. Beyond the smell of sigurette smoke and pine-laced wind and wet stone, beyond the rich cologne of Malfoy's arousal, I could smell Granger's scent on the ribbon. It was light and enchanting like the primavera that clung to the walls of the greenhouses. When the scent faded slightly, I opened my eyes and saw Malfoy disappearing down the twine of the staircase, his lady's brilliant token in his hand._

* * *

Hermione couldn't believe what a _cheater _Harry had become. First, the Half-Blood Prince and now Ron and the _Felix Felicis_. All to win a game of Quidditch. She wanted Ron to succeed more than anyone, but this was an illegal and frivolous use of Liquid Luck. As their drugged Keeper made another acrobatic save, Gryffindor House went wild. Lavender Brown shrieked and sobbed (literally) and nearly flung herself over the railing. Hermione crossed her arms and scowled at Harry, who hovered nearby on his broom. Then her eyes sought out the game's other Seeker. Draco Malfoy was across the pitch, near the Slytherin stands.

He was playing, so he must have seen her ribbon. Her favor. The plan was working.

She wondered where he'd hidden it. In a pocket or perhaps around his arm under his uniform. He would keep it secret. After all, he was the quintessential Slytherin, and half the girls in Gryffindor wore those ribbons. They'd been Christmas gifts from Seamus in fifth year. Any hint of one on Draco Malfoy's person would cause the schoolyard scandal of the year. Not that she cared about such trivial things. Hermione was a practical girl, scornful of gossip.

Yet, despite her pragmatism, there was something thrilling about this favor business. She felt swept up in the secrecy and romance of it. A knight promising to win a tournament for his lady fair. Not that she would ever be Malfoy's lady fair.

"Ridiculous," she muttered.

Suddenly, she remembered Draco's smoldering kisses. She blushed and thanked God it was cold, so she could blame the wind for her pink cheeks. A curl flew over her eyes. As she tucked it back into her hat, she heard a collective gasp. Harry was plummeting downward on his broom. She watched Draco mirror this action across the pitch. She ran, following the surge of spectators, to lean over the edge of the stands and watch the two Seekers chase their invisible quarry. The score was 110 to 20, Gryffindor, due to Ron's enhanced performance. Either Harry or Draco could win the game. They grappled down the length of the pitch, a blur of red and green, their knee pads grazing the frozen grass until Harry lunged. At the same instant, Draco veered. Harry tumbled off his broom, and Draco soared up into the sky with a triumphant yell, his right arm raised high.

"Game over!" Zacharias Smith's amplified voice rang out through the pitch. "Malfoy's caught the Snitch. Slytherin wins, 170 to 110!"

"Noooo!" Lavender wailed.

For once, Hermione was glad for her dramatics. It provided a distraction as she fought the traitorous elation that swept through her upon Draco's victory. She tucked her chin into her scarf to hide the half-smile lurking at the corners of her lips. What was _wrong_ with her? Ron had just lost the best game of his life. Harry had missed the Snitch by it golden wingspan. They would both fall into one of their Quidditch depressions, and the Slytherins would taunt them until winter hols.

Draco took a victory lap around the pitch, as his fellow snakes cheered. Hermione watched him, spellbound by the grace of his lean body guiding his broom, his green robes flying behind him and his white hair whipping in the wind. His smile took her breath away. He looked happier and more handsome than he had all term. Carefree. When he turned his gaze to her, still smiling, she had to lift her hands to her mouth, pretending to warm them, to hide her irrepressible grin.

"So, Granger," he called out. "Still think I'm a _so-called _athlete?"

She willed away her smile before shouting. "Fine, you're a fair athlete and a so-called git."

He passed the Gryffindor stands, just inches away from her. He still held out the Snitch, and one of its golden wings fluttered against her cheek with a light, feathery caress. She closed her eyes and remembered Draco's touch, just as delicate against the nape of her neck. She wanted to reach out and grab his robes and pull him back to her. She wanted to lean over the edge of the stands, high above the ground, and kiss him. She wanted to leap onto his broom, into the protection of his embrace, and fly far away.

How on earth had a few kisses turned her into such a romantic fool? She'd wanted Ron for years, her affections secret, earnest and constant. But she'd never been so obsessively lost in thoughts of him. She'd never masturbated to fantasies of him. Something was wrong.

When Lavender consoled Ron by kissing him in the middle of the Common Room, Hermione felt nothing but surprised amusement. Something was _very_ wrong.

With a groan, she realized her affections had transferred to a foul, loathsome cockroach.

* * *

**To be continued...**

**Reviews are welcomed.**


	3. Chapter Two

**Thank you so much for your reviews! Just know that if you aren't signed in when reviewing, I can't respond. So thank you to all Guest Reviewers, particularly random-stranger!**

* * *

**Chapter Two**

**He who is not jealous cannot love.**

* * *

_My name is Helena Ravenclaw, and I write so that I do not break the rhythm of the shuttling days, so that I do not forget a day and, therefore, lose a century to indulgent melancholy._

_It is Thursday, the 12__th__ day of December, 1996, according to their calendar._

_The lovers meet regularly now in the turret stairs. They greet each other with kisses that blossom like summer flowers, filling the air with heat and perfume. Sometimes, they just kiss for their stolen hour. Sometimes, they sit close together on the stairs and talk and laugh, the pleats of her skirt pressed against his trousers. Once, he told her that he liked the excess of her hair, its luxury. Since that day, she has worn it unbound for him, her wild curls cascading down her back. He twines his fingers in it when they talk or kiss._

_But today, Malfoy seemed angry. He still greeted Granger with kisses, but they were almost violent in their passion. His hands were rough in her long hair. After pressing her hard against the wall for a long moment, he pulled back, breathing hard. His gray eyes were black with desire and gleamed with a mad and desperate purpose. He took her hand and quickly led her upstairs, through the archway that led into the seventh floor corridor. I followed, apprehensive. I had seen a similar mad and desperate purpose in a man's eyes before. Shining eyes, filled with hurt and fury. I opened my mouth to speak, to tell her not to go with him, but then Malfoy stopped before the Door of Asking._

_It wasn't there yet, the door. There was just a wall. But I knew of this secret room. It had been crafted by the Founders, by my mother. It is a place where things are made and things are hidden. Beautiful things. Dark things. And one beautiful, glittering thing that I had once coveted, now corrupted by evil. _

_If you have to ask, you will never know. If you know, you need only ask._

_I don't know what Malfoy searches for in the Room. I don't know why he wanted to take Granger there. Still holding her hand, he closed his eyes and made his wish three times. A polished, wooden door appeared. Granger didn't protest as he led her inside, the door slamming shut behind them._

_I feared for her, but I hesitated. My nature, when I was flesh and now that I am vapor, has always been defined by reticence. By the time I flew to the door, as swiftly as I could, it had disappeared. I floated through the wall instead, into a black void. Wherever the two lovers were, they were not here. I dispersed, rising up, out of the castle, into the chill and sparkle of the night sky._

_I will have nothing to do with that room. I will not write another word about it._

* * *

The Room was empty except for an ornate, four-poster bed, luxurious with soft pillows and linens in bold Gryffindor red. Draco hadn't asked for this. He'd expected the Room of Missing Things, remembering the dusty, little bed amongst pillars of junk.

He was _done_ with kissing Hermione against walls, done with her false modesty. She always stopped him, her fingers grabbing his firmly when he touched her too intimately – through her satiny bra or high on her tights-clad thigh. He'd always respected her wishes. He'd acted with honor, though she'd kept him on the edge of bliss and agony for a month. Every night, he wanked to fantasies of her. Most days, after watching her eat lunch, his eyes darting glances to her lips, he had to hurry to a quiet bathroom for another go before his afternoon classes. And the whole time, she'd been fucking Harry Potter.

"Draco, you're hurting me," Hermione said, pulling her hand away from his hard grip. She flexed her fingers and then stared at the bed. "A bit presumptuous, don't you think?"

"I don't think so," he said, glaring at her. "Not with the way you slag around."

Her slap came out of nowhere, just like it had in third year. His head snapped to the side, his cheek stinging. For an instant, when her eyes had widened in shock, he'd regretted his harsh words. Now, fury boiled up inside him. As Hermione lifted her wand, no doubt to turn him into a slug, Draco grabbed it and pulled it out of her hand. She reached for it, stumbling, and he caught her against his body in a rough embrace.

"How dare you?" she said, so angry she was trembling. "I do _not_ slag around. I've never slept with anyone."

"That's not what I heard," he said in a soft, dangerous whisper. "McLaggen _and_ Potter?"

"Let me go!"

"_Somnus._"

Draco watched as Hermione feel asleep with her next breath, her eyes fluttering closed and her head falling back. She slumped, and he held her tight as he dropped down to one knee. She looked so helpless in his arms, the pale column of her throat vulnerable and her wrist twisted awkwardly against the stone floor. He felt like he'd slapped her in return, and a wave of hot shame swept through him.

"Hermione," he whispered. "Why?"

Her betrayal shouldn't hurt him this much. She was nothing, a Mudblood, unworthy of the respect he'd shown her. His father had taught him that Mudbloods were inferior to pure-bloods in every way and that pretty Mudblood women were good for one thing and one thing only. Draco stroked Hermione's curls away from her pretty face. He cradled her in his arms as he stood and walked to the conjured bed.

* * *

Textbooks didn't describe the strange, vivid dreams Hermione experienced under the Sleeping Spell. Or how they would be extinguished like a candle flame the instant she woke up. She kept her eyes closed, trying to remember, but they were gone, like smoke. She opened her eyes to the soft glow of a chandelier. She lay on the luxurious bed in the Room of Requirement under red sheets. Draco sat at the foot of the bed, leaning back against one of the four posts, his shoulders hunched. He looked guilty of something. Hermione's fingertips brushed against her wand, and she gripped it in her hand.

"What have you done to me?" she asked.

Draco gazed up at her, his pale eyes sad. "Nothing."

"How long was I asleep?"

"An hour."

"An hour! And you just watched me?" She pointed her wand at his heart. "Tell me the truth."

"I didn't do anything," he insisted. "I couldn't… I didn't even take off your shoes. I just covered you and waited for you to wake up."

Hermione twisted one of her ankles and felt the weight of her shoe. Her skirt, tights and all her other clothing seemed intact, but she knew from personal experience, with him, that plenty of shocking _things_ could happen while still dressed. She blushed at the memory. No boy – not Ron, not anyone - had ever made her feel so much. She remembered his comment about Cormac and Harry.

"You're jealous," she said.

"Yes," Draco answered with surprising honesty.

"I'm not seeing anyone but you," she said. "Cormac asked me to Slughorn's party, and I refused him. And Harry and I are just going as friends."

"The thought of you with anyone else, especially _him_, drives me mad. What does that mean?"

Hermione thought of the vicious stab of jealousy she felt every time she saw Draco laughing with Pansy or another Slytherin girl. She knew exactly what such feelings meant to her. They meant that she thought of Draco Malfoy as hers. Did he feel as possessive of her? She lowered her wand and said, "It means that you don't like Harry."

"Of course, I don't like Potter. My father's in Azkaban because of him."

"And because of me, too."

Draco's expression changed, his sadness burned away by an intense focus that left Hermione breathless. She watched, captivated, as he moved onto his hands and knees and crawled across the bed toward her. He kept going when she thought he would stop, twining one of his strong arms around her and pressing her body back against the sheets. He rose over her, his face in shadow. The light of the chandelier glowed behind the silhouette of his pale hair and broad shoulders. He pressed his hips forward, and she arched helplessly against him, her legs spreading apart. He moaned and snuggled closer until the hard length of his arousal was pressed intimately against her, through her tights and knickers. He placed one hand just above her breast.

"You nearly died from Dolohov's curse, didn't you?" he asked.

"Yes." Hermione could barely answer, her heart was beating so fast.

"It makes no sense," he whispered.

"What?"

"I felt nothing when I heard you were almost killed. Nothing. And now, I feel so much. Why do I feel so much for you?"

Before she could answer, Draco's lips were on hers, wet and soft and kissing her passionately. His hips moved with a slow, insistent rhythm, pressing her into the mattress even as her body pulsed up, seeking friction. She twisted her fingers into his hair and held him close.

"What do you feel for me?" she asked between kisses. She had to know.

"Not what I should."

"What should you feel?"

"Hatred. Disgust. I was taught that Muggle-borns are filth. That they have slow minds and weak magic." His actions belied every word he spoke as he worshipped her with kisses and the long stroke of her fingertips down her arm. "That they aren't capable of making intelligent decisions or moral choices because they have no real souls, like animals."

The word shocked Hermione. She pushed her hands against Draco's chest. "I am _not_ an animal," she snapped. "And I don't have a slow mind or weak magic."

"I know." Draco wouldn't be pushed away. He leaned down, angling his head, to kiss the delicate line of her jaw as he spoke. "I know that you're smart and powerful and brave. I know that you're kind and beautiful. That by just existing, you shatter everything that I've ever believed."

Hermione was stunned. Draco's words sounded like a love letter. He turned his head and rested it against her breast, breathing a sigh that heated her skin through her jumper and shirt. She waited in the stillness, for whatever he was about to say. Her hand cupped the nape of his neck as she stared down at the white-blond strands of his sleek hair.

"If they're so wrong about you," he said, "what else are they wrong about?"

She stroked her other hand down his arm, holding him in a fragile embrace.

"Everything, Draco. They're wrong about everything." She felt his muscles stiffen at her words.

"No. My whole life is… My whole life is built on this foundation."

Draco tried to pull away, but Hermione held him tighter, her grip strong.

"You can build a new life," she said.

"I can't. Hermione, you don't understand."

"I do understand. The Order can protect your family."

"No."

"Listen to me, Dumbledore can -"

"No!"

She'd gone too far and thought he would leave her. Instead, he rose above her again. She opened her mouth to speak, and he kissed her with a brutal force with made her head reel. He shifted his body, until his erection was pressed against one of her thighs. She felt a sudden coolness against her legs and realized that Draco had Vanished her black tights. He stroked his hand under her skirt, his fingers moving up, hot and insistent, until his touch grazed the lacy edge of her knickers.

"Hermione, let me. Please." She surrendered with a faint _yes_. She spread her legs wider, and Draco's fingers slipped inside the silky fabric.

In some small part of her pleasure-drugged mind, Hermione knew she was being distracted. She didn't care as Draco's touch softly brushed against her clit. She cried out and flung her head back as her body twisted up to meet his hand. He kissed and suckled the side of her neck roughly, sending wild shivers through her, but the fingers exploring her intimate heat were gentle. They moved in steady circles, with perfect pressure. Touching herself was good, but it had never given her such lush sensations. She felt like she was rising up, warm and trembling. She clutched at Draco's shoulders.

"Oh, God! Kiss me!" She was so close and she _had_ to be kissing him when she came. She didn't know why, only that she needed it.

Draco kissed her, and she moaned. She stroked her hands down his back, clutching his arse and pulling him close. His hard cock rubbed against her thigh, and he came suddenly, crying out into her mouth. Three more swift circles of his fingers, and she was coming, too, with a sharp inhale, her back arched. For one, long, ravishing moment, she held her breath, held _his_ breath, inside of her. Every part of her seemed to open up and soar - her heart and mind hurtling beautifully out of control, her legs falling wide and her juices flowing out onto Draco's fingers. When she finally breathed out, sighing with bliss, her body folded in. She rolled into Draco's embrace, her arms and legs tucking tight against him, her head resting against his chest. He cuddled her close, and she closed her eyes. It was so right, so perfect.

When her reason began to return, whispering that it wasn't right, that it wasn't perfect, she ignored the truth and just let herself be held.

* * *

**To be continued...**

**Thank you for reading – reviews are welcomed!**


	4. Chapter Three

**Chapter Three**

**No one can be bound by a double love.**

* * *

Draco Malfoy was bound by two masters. Fear and love.

He'd told himself that he'd taken the Dark Mark and served the Dark Lord to restore his family's honor and position, but in truth, he only obeyed because he was terrified. He didn't want to suffer and die, and he didn't want his parents to suffer and die. The Malfoy signet ring, which he'd worn since his father's incarceration, was like a chain binding him.

In equally helpless obedience, he followed his heart, which desired Hermione Granger above all else. His choices were made to win her favor with startling frequency. He ignored the Cabinet, asking the Room for the red bed instead, always yearning for the night she would give him everything. She never did, but each time she gave him a little more. More than once, he'd almost revealed his Mark to her in his eagerness. He told himself it was only lust he felt, but in truth, it was love.

He ignored his mission to kill the Headmaster until the day before Christmas break. And then, knowing he couldn't face the red horror of the Dark Lord's gaze without something to report, he took the enchanted Galleon out of his pocket and whispered his orders to it. He'd once scoffed at the simplicity of the barmaid's mind, how easy it was to pour it, like wine, into whatever vessel he wished. He realized that his mind was just as vulnerable to the Dark Lord's insight. He remembered cold fingers on his face, the smell of the grave rising from white skin.

He should have met Hermione in the Room an hour ago, after Slughorn's party. Instead, he sat on a black leather couch in the Slytherin Common Room with his friends, staring at the blazing fire.

_You can build a new life._

He could go to Hermione now, find her in Gryffindor Tower if he must. He could give himself up to her and never look back. The relief he felt at that thought was so seductive that he leaned forward, ready, his heart beating with fear and excitement. Then he saw his mother, her neck snapped and blood trickling from her mouth, on the floor of the drawing room. He saw his father, gasping, in the darkness of Azkaban, as a Dementor sucked out his soul. That was what would happen if he defied the Dark Lord.

He had no choice.

He thought of Hermione's kiss, her soft lips against his, the way her wild hair brushed against his skin like sparks. Last night, fully clothed, she'd straddled him as they'd kissed, moving with such sweet urgency that he'd lost control. He'd warned her, but she hadn't stopped. She'd just moved her hips faster and watched him as he fell apart. _Your face, Draco. The way you look._ Too full of hot purpose to even bother cleaning himself, he'd tossed her onto her back and proceeded to put the same look on her face. She'd let him go farther than she ever had before. When she'd come with breathy cries, his fingers had been inside her knickers, stroking her, and his tongue had been teasing the pink tip of one, bared breast. He was hard now, just remembering the way her body blushed and arched and shuddered beneath him.

"Draco, what's wrong with you? You're as jumpy as a wet Kneazle."

Dazed, he looked into Pansy's sharp, blue eyes.

"Nothing," he snapped, looking away.

If Pansy could see his secret on his face, there was no way the Dark Lord wouldn't see it in his mind. He would know about Hermione.

"I'm just behind on my Potions project," he said. "I'm staying over the holidays."

"When did you decide this?" Pansy asked, irritated. She liked to think she knew everything about him.

Draco didn't answer her as he rose and walked to his room to write a carefully-worded letter to his mother. As he pressed his father's signet ring into the parchment's wax seal, he felt a mild heat inside his jacket pocket. He pulled out the enchanted Galleon. Glittering in the light of a single candle, the dragon on its golden surface shifted into letters. Madam Rosmerta would act on his orders tonight.

He reached into another pocket, the white shirt pocket over his chest, and pulled out Hermione's red and gold ribbon.

Why couldn't his life be simpler? He was only sixteen. Why couldn't he just play Quidditch and seduce the girl he liked and pass his N.E.W.T.s and imagine a future unclouded by darkness?

They had been wrong about Hermione. Were they also wrong about purity and blood?

Draco closed his eyes and let his head drop into his hands. The ribbon grazed his face, stroking warmth down his cheek each time it turned red. He couldn't seek out Hermione tonight, no matter how much he wanted her, no matter how desperately he would miss her during break.

His will was too weak.

* * *

Hermione watched Draco on the Marauder's Map.

She'd borrowed it from Harry the night before leaving on holiday, asking him to trust her and promising she would explain her strange request in January. Two hours after Draco hadn't met her in the Room of Requirement, she'd watched him walk from the dungeons to the Owlery and back despite the bitterly cold snow. The next morning, she'd used the map to avoid him, angry and hurt that he'd stood her up the night before. She took a carriage to Hogsmeade after breakfast while he was still in his dorm. Three hours toward London, hiding in the loo, she'd realized he wasn't even on the train but still at Hogwarts.

"What are you doing?" she murmured. She watched Draco's name and pair of little footprints walk out of the Great Hall and halfway up the Grand Staircase before someone pounded on the door.

"Hurry up in there!" Susan Bones shouted. "I drank too much pumpkin juice."

The next three times Hermione checked the map, Draco was nowhere on it. Perhaps he'd gone home another way.

On Christmas Eve, she saw his footprints appear out of nowhere, near the Room of Requirement. On Christmas Day, in the same location, she saw them disappear. The Room was Unplottable, and he'd stayed behind to enter it every day and pursue the mission Voldemort had given to him, unwatched. His hours were long and regular – entering the Room around ten in the morning and leaving just before midnight.

Hermione's whole body burned with shame and rage. She'd been a fool to think she could change Draco Malfoy. He believed only what his father told him to believe, what Voldemort believed. She'd lost her way and lost her heart to an enemy.

_Either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives._

The matter was simple. Draco served Voldemort. And Harry could die facing Voldemort. Every time she'd met Draco in secret, every time she'd touched him or kissed or let him pleasure her, she'd been betraying her best friend.

She could only choose one side, and she didn't hesitate.

She'd go to the Burrow tomorrow and confess her weakness to Harry and Ron. She would ask Harry to forgive her. Deep inside, where she imagined her most essential feelings lived, she knew he would. Then she would show them both the map and tell them her suspicions.

That night, alone in her childhood bedroom, she took a small present out of her beaded purse. It fit in her palm and was wrapped in shining green paper and silver ribbon, for him. She dropped it into her mug of eggnog, where it bobbed like a festive, little barge. Then she drew out her wand.

"_Incendio._"

The bourbon in her drink flared into a tall flame. She held the mug like a torch and watched Draco's gift burn to ash.

It was over.

* * *

_It is Sunday, the 29__th__ day of December, 1996, according to their calendar._

_Today, I witnessed a life being saved, and I saw the ghost of the man who killed me._

_I had stopped following Malfoy since his path so often took him to the room that I hated. Yet the castle was very still at Christmastime, and both my loneliness and curiosity, great. Every night, near midnight, I would haunt the seventh floor corridor. He would come out of the room, weary and sad, his shoulders hunched. Whatever he was seeking, he could not find it, and the weight of his failure made him seem as gray and insubstantial as me._

_Tonight was different. He stayed in the room well past midnight, and when he finally left it, there was a crazed gleam in his pale eyes. He carried nothing, but I wondered if he had found the hidden thing he had been seeking. I wondered what it was. As he closed the door behind him, a yellow bird flew out of the cursed room and landed on the long, iron rod that supported the tapestry of the dancing trolls. The bird chirped once, and Malfoy looked up at it, his expression mystified, as the door behind him became a wall again._

_Then, quite strangely, another bird entered the corridor. A ghostly, silver-white Patronus in the form of a fat magpie. It fluttered about, in a misty panic, until it stopped to float before Malfoy. _

"_Help me!" it said in a man's voice. "I've been…" I recognized the voice of the new Potion Master. The plea of the Patronus ended with an ominous gurgle._

"_Slughorn," Malfoy said. He hesitated for a moment before running to the turret stairs and down to the professor's office on the sixth floor. I followed him, silently gliding, and watched from a corner of the ceiling as he knelt over the Potion Master. The man's short limbs were twitching. His eyes were wide, and trail of white foam had spilled out of his mouth onto his three chins. His skin was a purplish-blue. A noxious odor rose from the bottle of mead that had fallen to the floor, its amber contents unpleasantly staining a luxurious carpet._

_Poison. This man was going to die._

_As Malfoy rushed to the Potion Master's cabinets and began frantically, and futilely, searching its regiment of small drawers, I wondered at the form of the man's Patronus. He looked more like a walrus than a magpie, with his large moustache. Then to my surprise, Malfoy took a bezoar out of a vial and rushed to shove it down the Potion Master's throat. Perhaps the man would survive after all. His entire body shuddered, jiggling like pudding, and then he went absolutely still._

_Why would someone want to poison the Potion Master? Did he know a secret? Was he the target of an enemy's vengeance?_

"_I'm sorry," Malfoy kept saying over and over. "Professor, I'm sorry. Please, wake up! Please!"_

_I heard footsteps rushing toward the room from two directions. Wisely, the man had sent out more than one magpie. I also sensed a strange shift the air's pressure and temperature, which could only signal one thing. I shrank back, halfway through the ceiling, but he appeared too soon, bellowing about Slytherin House and intrigue and injustice. His black eyes shone with unholy light. His chains rattled as he gestured wildly. His robes were stained with silver blood. My blood. I avoided him assiduously and had not seen him in over three hundred years. I was frozen with terrible dread._

_Malfoy gazed up at him, pleading, "Baron, save him! This wasn't supposed to happen!" _

"_My boy," the Baron said. "The Headmaster is on his way, as are others. Who is responsible for this outrageous crime?"_

_When he looked toward the heavens, for someone to blame for the poisoning of a member of his vile House, he saw me. His black eyes opened wide. Shock and pain marked his gaunt face. It was the same expression he had worn when he'd stared down at my mangled body on the forest floor a thousand years ago._

"_My lady," he whispered and rose a fraction of an inch closer to me._

_I screamed, and every diamond-paned window in the Potion Master's office shattered into glittering dust._

_I do not remember what happened next. When I was aware, again, of my spectral body and of my mind, I was safely tucked within Ravenclaw Tower reading a book._

_I will have nothing to do with that demon of a man. I will not write another word about him._

* * *

Panicked, Draco had dropped his wand while searching for the bezoar.

So when he looked up to find the source of the inhumanly resonant scream and saw the windows shatter, he had no defense. It happened too fast, but he saw every detail. The glass, ten thousand razor shards, flew toward the Bloody Baron. They passed through the ghost, causing him to shimmer for an instant and then found the next target in their path.

Frozen with fascination, Draco didn't close his eyes in time. The pain was excruciating, almost as intense as the Cruciatus. Later, he would wonder what his face had looked like then – blood encrusted with diamonds. He screamed, and it hurt even more. He clutched at his hair, pulling it hard to fight the agony.

Three seconds later, the pain was gone and a pair of strong hands held him by his shoulders. He couldn't see his savior. He couldn't see at all. His eyes were ruined.

"I've got you, Draco," he heard the Headmaster's calm, gentle voice. "I've got you."

* * *

"Have you contacted his mother?"

"Yes. She'll be here within the hour."

"How is he responding to treatment?"

"Very well, as the young often do. His skin's all healed, and the potions should restore his eyes within two days. I hope I got the color right."

_I hope you did, too,_ Draco thought.

He breathed slowly to feign sleep as he listened to Madam Pomfrey and Dumbledore speak somewhere to the left of his hospital bed. His damaged eyes were covered with a cool bandage. Inside his skull, he felt his optic nerves tingling. His whole body seemed to itch with the need to move.

"I can't believe the Grey Lady screamed like that," Madam Pomfrey said. "She's always been so quiet."

"Well, it's understandable under the circumstance."

"Is it?"

"Yes," the Headmaster said without elaboration. After a long silence, Draco heard Pomfrey's heels clack across the tile floor.

"Professor Slughorn is doing well, too," she said. "I believe Mr. Malfoy saved his life."

"He did," Dumbledore agreed. "His actions tonight were swift and resourceful. One hundred points to Slytherin."

It took all of Draco's will not to react to the distant clatter of emeralds sifting through the Slytherin House hourglass in the Entrance Hall. He knew that things like the House Cup didn't matter now, not when he'd fixed the Cabinet, but he couldn't stop the pride that filled his chest like fresh air.

"Poppy, please tell him about the points he was awarded when he wakes up."

"Yes, Headmaster."

"I would also like him to know that he can talk to me if he needs anything. Anything at all. Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it."

_Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it._

Draco experienced an inexplicable rush of relief at those words. He pushed it aside, feeling foolish. He didn't need anyone's help now. He'd done what no one else could do. He'd found a way to infiltrate Hogwarts. He'd fixed the broken Vanishing Cabinet. The bird was still alive, after three trips to Borgin and Burkes tonight. Draco could let Death Eaters into the school any time he wished. Then someone else could kill Dumbledore. His Aunt Bellatrix would happily do it. He wouldn't even have to raise his wand, except to speak an incantation and open a pathway between two doors.

With that simple act, he would win the Dark Lord's favor. He would restore his family's honor and bring glory to the Malfoy name. All he had to do was tell them he'd succeeded. A note passed through the Cabinet would suffice. He should act as soon as he was healed, when Potter wasn't here to interfere, when most of the students were gone.

When Hermione was safe at home.

Why, then, did he want to keep the knowledge hidden deep inside, like a secret never told?

"Have you fixed it?" his mother whispered an hour later, as she stroked his hand. Draco had recognized her brisk, commanding step the moment she'd entered the infirmary.

He hesitated, seeing nothing but darkness.

"No," he finally said.

* * *

Draco sensed the presence of someone at his bedside when he woke up in the middle of the night. He held still and breathed evenly, in case it was Dumbledore. He suspected Madam Pomfrey had seen his Dark Mark when she'd changed him into his hospital-issue pajamas, and she would have certainly told the Headmaster. That was a conversation he wanted to avoid.

He felt his bed dip slightly as the person sat on the edge of it, near his hip. This wasn't the Headmaster. It was someone slender, a girl. She lightly touched the back of his hand, and he felt a pleasurable shiver run over his skin.

"Hermione," he said, certain it was her. He opened his eyes but couldn't see through the single layer of gauze wrapped over them.

"Yes," Hermione answered. Draco turned his wrist and gripped her hand in his. His other hand reached up, searching, and found her long, curly hair. Arousal swept through him. And a blazing happiness. He hadn't been this happy since the last time he'd seen her. He was never happy now unless he could see her. _I love her_, he realized with a startling clarity, his heart racing. _I love her._

"I heard you were hurt," she said. "What happened?"

He composed himself, dropping his hand from Hermione's hair. She slipped her fingers away from his and gently traced the edge of the bandage over his eyes. "Long story," he said. "Glass. Pomfrey had to grow new eyes for me."

"Are they finished?"

"Yes, the bandage just guards against any bright lights."

"_Lumos minima._"

Through the gauze, Draco saw a yellow glow in the darkness. He felt Hermione's fingers unwrap the bandage and lift it from his eyes. He looked up at her, waiting as his cloudy focus sharpened until he could make out her face. It was the loveliest thing he'd ever seen. The dim _Lumos_ lit her skin and hair with soft beauty. Her dark eyes gazed down on him with concern.

"They're a bit lighter," she said. "And even more beautiful."

Draco lifted his hands again and held Hermione's face. He had to kiss her. He'd missed her so much. She resisted the gentle pressure of his touch, shaking her head. He realized that the whites of her eyes were rimmed in red. She'd been crying. He felt like he'd been punched in the stomach.

"Hermione, what's wrong?"

"I want to be with you," she whispered. "I want to be with you almost more than anything. But I can't ignore this any longer."

Draco felt her fingers slide over the skin of his left forearm, and he knew before he looked down. His sleeve was rolled back, and his Dark Mark was revealed. He gazed, in horror, at Hermione's fingers against the black skull and serpent. Could Voldemort feel her touch? He pushed her away, his entire body filling with panic and dread.

Hermione watched Draco cover the Mark with his sleeve, his fingers shaking. She stood up, clutching her hands together behind her back so she wouldn't reach out for him.

This was the hardest thing she'd ever had to do.

"Draco, I know you've been given a mission. I know you work on it every day in the Room of Requirement." He didn't meet her gaze, his new eyes turned away from the light of her _Lumos_. She felt the heat of tears in her throat as she continued, her voice choked. "I care for you. But I can't be with you, not while you serve Voldemort."

She saw a flash of vulnerability cross his face before he masked it with a sneer and glared up at her.

"Why not? Think I'm not _good_ enough for you?" He said the word _good_ as if it were pathetic.

Hermione stared at him. He wasn't. He wasn't good enough.

Good wasn't pathetic. It was essential. Harry's parents and godfather had died fighting evil. Neville's parents had lost their sanity combating it. Good wasn't medals or glory. It was blood and tears and sacrifice. It was doing the right thing despite terrible fear and making the right choice even when it was hard. Or heartbreaking.

It didn't matter that Draco Malfoy was smart or that his sharp wit made her smile. It didn't matter that she had conversations with him she couldn't have with anyone else. Or that she would never, in all her life, forget his devastating kisses. He wasn't good. His allegiance had been chosen for him before his birth, and his conscience hadn't turned him from that dark path.

Draco read her thoughts on her face and turned away. His eyes were downcast, his jaw held tense against the powerful emotions assailing him.

"Get out," he muttered.

Tears rolled down Hermione's cheeks. It wasn't too late. She could kiss him one more time. She could try to convince him. She could beg. Instead, with a supreme concentration of will, she took a step back.

"If your loyalties change, send me the ribbon, and I will come to you," she said. "Until then, we are enemies."

She turned and walked away before her strength failed her. She forced herself not to run, her steady steps echoing through the vast infirmary. She didn't look back when she paused at the door.

"I believe in you," she said, loud enough for him to hear, and then she left.

* * *

**To be continued...**

**Thank you for reading - reviews are welcomed. :)**


	5. Chapter Four

**Chapter Four**

**He whom the thought of love vexes, eats and sleeps very little.**

* * *

_My name is Helena Ravenclaw, and I write so that I do not break the rhythm of the shuttling days, so that I do not forget a day and, therefore, lose a century to indulgent melancholy._

_It is Saturday, the 1__st__ day of February, 1997, according to their calendar. I cannot believe that just a month has passed since I last wrote in these pages. My encounter with the Baron was distressing. I have lost years of time before due to events much less provoking than that. I believe it is my continued interest in the story of Granger and Malfoy that awakened me to life in the castle again so soon._

_The lovers do not meet in secret anymore or kiss on the turret stairs. They do not even speak to each other. Neither eats enough, and they both have dark circles under their eyes from lack of sleep. This is surely a sign that they have fought or that one of them has spurned the other. _

_But I see what they seek to hide. When they believe no one is watching, they gaze at each other, with yearning._

_Malfoy still goes to that room but not for long and not every day. I wonder if he has abandoned the task that had once consumed him. He spends less time in the company of his Slytherin friends and more time alone, in private lessons or in the library. There is a restless tension in the air around him. He is watchful and nervous. And his eyes are different now, paler. When the moonlight illuminates them at night, they are quite striking. Sometimes, when alone, he takes Granger's ribbon out of his pocket and gazes at its brilliance._

_Granger's habits are much changed, too. I believe she studies as diligently as she ever did but her trips to the library are brief. She spends all her spare time in the Gryffindor Common Room. Sir Nicholas told me that she and the remarkable one requested a meeting with the Headmaster in his office at the start of term but that he didn't know the reason for why, which seemed to bother him very much. _

"_I am their ghost," Sir Nicholas had said. He'd lifted his chin proudly, and his head had wobbled. "They should feel they can confide in me if they need any assistance." _

_I had watched Granger and Malfoy behave in this new, distant way for a week until today, when they met again on the turret stairs._

_It was another Kwidatch tournament day. Despite the winter winds, almost everyone in Hogwarts walked down to the arena, carrying pennants and chattering with excitement. Ravenclaw was to play Slytherin. Unlike Sir Nicholas, I do not feel the need to be admired by the children of my House. However, I could not help but smile when I saw Luna wearing a giant hat fashioned to resemble an eagle in flight. Its shrill cries echoed through the corridors._

_Malfoy was waiting on the turret stairs for Granger. He wore his green Kwidatch uniform. His broom was balanced against the curving wall in the center of the turret. I watched as Granger approached, lingering behind a group of Gryffindors as she pulled on her gloves. There were the normal sneers and insults between the snake and the lions. Malfoy hadn't even bothered to conjure a sigurette this time. There was no logical reason for him to be here, so far from the dungeons or the arena. When Granger saw him, her eyes widened, and she stopped several steps above him. Her friends, oblivious, went on without her._

"_Hello," he whispered, gazing up at her._

"_Hello," she said. For a moment, her dark eyes seemed wistful. Then she looked away. "You're so thin."_

"_You, too."_

"_January was… a difficult month."_

"_For me as well." His voice held a profound sadness. _

"_I can only imagine," she said coldly. She looked down at him with anger snapping in her eyes. Her expression changed to one of surprise when Malfoy pulled her ribbon out of a pocket inside his robes. It gleamed, a lustrous red and gold, in the morning light that filtered softly through the turret's slim arrow slits. _

"_I still carry this with me," he said. "Wherever I go. But I don't have your favor any longer, do I?" _

_Granger is silent, and Malfoy took two tentative steps up, until he stood on the stair below hers. Their eyes were at the same level, and he stared at her with unabashed longing._

"_I miss you so much," he said._

_I sensed the change in her body. A soft gasp that signaled her quickening breath and heartbeat, her temperature rising and the air all around her shifting as she wished, more than anything, to lean forward and kiss him._

"_Have you left his service?" she asked._

"_No."_

"_Then I… I can't…" Granger shook her head and turned to leave, to run upstairs so she didn't have to pass him in the narrow space. Malfoy moved quickly, grabbing her arm. He held it up against his chest with both his hands, like something too precious to release. He rested his lips against sleeve of her wool coat, at the inside of her elbow. Granger's body was a study in contradiction and clashing desires. She was faced away from Malfoy, her forehead and free hand resting against the stone wall of the turret. Yet she accepted his strange embrace with her stillness, her captured hand resting passively against the muscles of his arm. The next word spoken, the next movement made would determine everything. If I had breath to hold, I would have held it in suspense of wondering._

_Would Granger move her wrist to caress Malfoy's sleeve and welcome his advances? Would he turn her and pull her into his arms? Or would she slip away from his grasp?_

"_Hermione." Her eyelashes fluttered closed at the sound of his voice speaking her given name so tenderly. After a long pause, he said, "I hope one day to be worthy of you."_

_Granger made a sound like a sob. I could see the glitter of tears on her cheeks. She pressed her fingers hard against the wall until her knuckles turned white. Her other hand lay perfectly still against Malfoy's arm._

_Without turning around, she murmured, "I hope for that day, too." _

_He didn't resist as she slipped away. He turned and watched her as she ran up the turret stairs and out of sight. I think he might have stared all day at the empty air where she had been if his broom had not slipped and fallen onto the stairs with a clatter. With language I won't repeat, he picked it up and ran up the turret stairs, two at a time, to the lonely, little balcony. Its ancient wood creaked as he placed his foot on it. In a whirl of robes, he was on his broom and racing across the gray sky._

_I floated out onto the balcony and looked out toward the mountains. I turned my gaze down to the lake, which was glazed with a thick layer of ice. Deep below, I saw the hazy, graceful slither of the squid's tentacles. I heard the first cheers from the Kwidatch arena. Ravenclaw won the game, and the Common Room was host to a raucous celebration. I passed the night in the Astronomy Tower. _

_I could tell by the scent of lemon drop candy that the Headmaster had recently been there, but now, he was gone._

* * *

**Love can deny nothing to love.**

* * *

It was Valentine's Day at Hogwarts, and Hermione was annoyed.

There were so many birds swooping in and out of the Great Hall at breakfast that feathers kept landing in her eggs. Tiny green and peach-colored lovebirds delivered small bags of candy conversation hearts that spoke sentiments like "Be Mine!" and "Hot Stuff" in squeaky voices. Pairs of doves carried stuffed unicorns, boxes of chocolates and balloons charmed to explode into bouquets. The heaviest gifts, like Ernie Macmillan's antique music box to Padma Patil (which was actually very beautiful) were carried by disgruntled owls with pink ribbons tied around their necks. Most popular were the Krooners, a Valentine's Day version of Howlers. They were pink with glittery wings and bright red lips that bellowed love songs to their recipients before ripping themselves up into heart-shaped confetti.

A small, bitter part of Hermione admitted that the whole spectacle might not be so aggravating if there were any chance she might receive her own Krooner. But there wasn't. It also didn't help that she was sitting beside Ginny, who was snogging Harry to thank him for her new Firebolt, and Lavender, who was snogging Ron to thank him for her new moon crystal bracelet.

Hermione sighed as another feather floated into her eggs. She tapped her plate with her fork three times, and the house-elves Vanished it into the kitchen sinks. Still hungry, she plucked a raspberry muffin from a nearby basket.

"Isn't that Malfoy's owl?" she heard someone say at the Hufflepuff table. "What's it carrying? A bloody mouse?"

Hermione immediately scanned the hall and saw Draco's eagle owl, Valerius. It wasn't wearing a pink ribbon, and it carried something small and red in his talons. She drew a sharp breath as the majestic bird flew straight toward her, landing where her plate had just been. It beat its wings as it settled, knocking both the kissing couples beside her in the head.

"Good owl," Hermione said, feeding it a chunk of her muffin.

"Isn't that Malfoy's bird?" Harry asked, his voice dazed from snogging.

"It is," said Lavender with a shrewd glance at Hermione.

Ignoring them, Hermione pulled her ribbon out of the owl's grip. It gleamed red to gold. Her heart began to race. She'd told Draco only to send her the ribbon when his loyalties had changed. What did this mean? She turned the ribbon over and saw the message he'd written in black ink.

_The turret stairs._

"Oh, God. Gin, may I?" Without waiting for an answer, Hermione snatched Ginny's new broom off the table, straddled it and flew out of the Great Hall. With perfect form.

"Uhh," Ron said. "Did any of you know that Hermione could fly?"

"Uhh, no," Harry answered.

"Boys," Lavender said, exasperated. "She's flown just fine since fourth year, after lessons with Viktor Krum."

"Then why doesn't she ever... you know, fly?" Ron asked.

"She says she doesn't see the value in it."

Harry and Ron clearly didn't understand that sentence. They looked at Lavender as if antlers had sprouted out of her blond curls. Ginny just looked stunned.

"She took my Firebolt," she said, gazing forlornly at Harry. He wrapped his arm around her shoulder.

"I'll get it back, Ginny. Don't worry."

Lavender snorted at Ginny's priorities and admired the lovely bracelet Ron had given her, twisting her wrist to make it sparkle in the morning light.

"True Love!" a conversation heart squeaked nearby.

"Indeed," Lavender said with a grin.

* * *

It had been three minutes since Draco had sent his owl. Hermione should have his message now. He waited, wondering if she would do as she'd promised.

_If your loyalties change, send me the ribbon, and I will come to you._

Something moved fast in the corner of his vision. Probably another poor owl with a pink ribbon around its neck. The skies were busy today. He turned and was shocked to see Hermione zooming around the curve of Gryffindor Tower on a Firebolt.

"I thought you couldn't fly," he muttered.

But she could. Quite beautifully, in fact, with grace and a touch of swagger. God, if he hadn't been in love before… She was perfect, with the wind whipping through her dark curls and her robes flying behind her. Her eyes met his, and he smiled. She didn't return the smile, her expression sober, as she executed a smooth stop and hovered beside the balcony. Her cheeks and nose were pink. The wind fluttered the hem of her pleated skirt, revealing more of her legs, which were covered in black tights.

"Is that a Firebolt, Granger?" he asked, trying to sound nonchalant.

"Ginny's Valentine's Day present."

"Well, I guess there are advantages to shagging the Boy Who Lived to Inherit."

"Said the heirling," Hermione mocked, holding out her hand. "Stand back. I don't think that balcony will hold us both."

Draco took her hand, his pulse racing, and obeyed with a smile he couldn't suppress. She was here, and here quickly, so she must be willing to give him a chance. After he told her, they would be friends at the very least, and if they were friends, then maybe he could work towards becoming more. He pulled her hand, guiding her and the Firebolt over the balcony railing. Then he stepped back, his hand slipping out of hers. She kicked one leg over the broom and slid off of it, her feet landing with a light creak on the old wood.

"Careful," he warned.

She stood before him with the broom in her hand. Her other hand rose up. It held up the red and gold ribbon, the favor bestowed upon him so many months ago.

"Tell me why you sent me this," she said.

"I've defected," he answered simply. "We're no longer enemies. I don't serve the Dark Lord anymore."

"What exactly do you mean by _defected_?"

She wanted to know he wasn't dabbling or just contemplating making a move. She wanted to know that he was committed.

"What I mean is that I went to Dumbledore the morning after you left me in the hospital. I told him everything. I showed him my Dark Mark and confessed to casting the Imperius Curse on Madam Rosmerta so that she would smuggle a cursed necklace and some poisoned mead into the school. My weak attempts to kill the Headmaster as ordered. I told him I'd repaired a Vanishing Cabinet in the Room of Requirement, and that its mate was at Borgin and Burkes, just waiting for my word, to bring Death Eaters into Hogwarts."

Hermione's eyes widened. "A Vanishing Cabinet. And you fixed it?" she asked.

"Yes, at the end of December."

"That was six weeks ago. What have you been doing all this time?"

"Preparing. Waiting. My father was transferred yesterday morning to another prison, where he could be protected from Voldemort's retaliation. The location is secret, even from me. My mother and her sister, Andromeda, were taken, too. Somewhere safe. I don't know where." Draco paused before continuing. He lifted his hand to show Hermione his silver signet ring. "As head of my family, I have opened the Manor and our vaults for the Order's use. I've pledged to serve in any way I can. After a month of Occlumency lessons with Professor Snape, it was decided I couldn't be used as a spy. The Dark Lord… Voldemort would be able to penetrate my mind too easily. He would see my betrayal. So we used the weapon I'd created to strike at him."

"The Cabinet."

"Yes. It was moved out of Hogwarts to an Order facility. Twenty Death Eaters are in our custody now, including Bellatrix. It all happened three hours ago. He should be finding out right about now. Lupin said - "

Draco's words faded as Hermione dropped the Firebolt. She marched toward him, her expression fierce. She wrenched her hair back and tied it with the red ribbon, her motions forceful. Mesmerized, he couldn't look away or say a word although he was almost certain he was about to get slapped again. He stood his ground, bracing himself to take whatever she gave.

When she reached him, Hermione raised both her cold hands to his face, and all her ferocity melted into tenderness. Her fingers slid into his hair, and Draco's eyes shut at the glorious sensation of it.

"Look at me," she said. He forced his eyes open.

Hermione gazed up at him, and hope ran wild inside his chest with thudding beats. He'd never seen such a look in her eyes before. It was pure adoration. It was how he felt about her, but he couldn't bring himself to believe it. She swayed toward him, her body pressing against him. His hands moved to grasp her waist.

"I love you," she said.

Draco couldn't help it. His eyes closed again, powerful emotion surging through him. He felt like he'd just leapt off the tower without an ounce of fear. In this falling, free space - he was bound only by the brush of Hermione's fingers against the nape of his neck. He bent his head down, a slave to her lightest touch, and felt the heat of her breath on his lips the instant before she kissed him.

He had dared to hope for this, but part of him had never really believed it would happen. With a groan of need, he pulled Hermione closer. She tasted like raspberries, tart and sweet at the same time. He swept his tongue across hers and pressed his erection against her belly. Her hands tightened in his hair. He grew dizzy with arousal and an elation that threatened to overwhelm him.

Hermione Granger loved him. It was unbelievable. She was so wonderful and so good. He'd been lost in darkness before they had met that day on the turret stairs. Their first kiss had been a burst of light. Every worthy thing he'd done since, he'd done for her. Every risk he'd taken, every promise he'd made - to win her favor. His family was lost to him for the duration of the war. His father, whom he had once idolized, might never forgive him. Lifelong friends would become enemies, and, unthinkably, his enemies must now become friends. The Dark Lord would seek a terrible vengeance.

But he knew what he was doing was right. He knew it in his black soul and in his besotted heart. And he would do it all again, a thousand times, just to feel Hermione's lips moving so sweetly against his.

"I love you, too," he whispered. "God, I love you so much."

Hermione gasped in surprise and kissed him harder. He felt her hands on his robes, pulling at fabric until it ripped. Her fingers, still chilled from the February wind, reached under the front of his jumper and shirt. His body jerked from the shock and pleasure of her cold touch on his stomach. He stumbled back, dragging her after him several steps, never breaking their kiss, until his spine hit the center pillar of the turret stairs. His hands roamed under her skirt and squeezed her arse through her black tights.

"Draco, please," she pleaded.

"Anything," he said. His kisses strayed, trailing down her throat. He bit her neck gently, and she made a wild sound that sent an ache straight to his cock. "Tell me."

"I want you."

"I want you, too."

"No, I mean, I want you _now_. Inside of me. Take me to bed."

_Oh, fuck yes._

Hermione laughed – a throaty, beguiling sound – and Draco realized he'd cursed out loud. He smiled, brimming with happiness, stupid with it, and lifted her into his arms as if she were his bride. She twined her arms around his neck, and he carried her down the stairs until they reached the archway to the seventh floor corridor. Bold as day, not caring who saw them, he walked to the wall.

Before he told the Room his wish, he looked down at Hermione. Her cheeks were flushed, and her lips, plump with his kisses. She gazed back at him with that extraordinary look of adoration. Careful not to speak his thoughts aloud this time, he vowed, _One day, I'll make you my bride._

"Are you certain?" he said. "It's your first time."

"I've never been more certain. And it's your first time, too. You've never been with someone you loved before."

"No," he said.

Like all pure-blood wizards from wealthy families, Draco had lost his virginity at fourteen to a sex witch at an exclusive, Parisian brothel. It had been brilliant. So brilliant that he'd developed a few, discreet relationships with girls in Slytherin and Ravenclaw. Never Pansy, although he knew she wanted him. He didn't return her affections, not in that way. She was his oldest friend, and he couldn't risk losing her. Although now, with his defection, he surely had.

Viktor Krum had given Hermione her first kiss, but all her other firsts would belong to Draco, now and forever. This knowledge filled him with a potent mix of pride and possession. She was his.

There was so much they hadn't done, that he longed to do. Draco had touched Hermione through her clothes. He'd seen her bare breasts and sucked and kissed her nipples. He'd never seen her pussy, but he'd touched her wet clit until she came. Afterwards, he'd tasted her on his fingers. She'd never seen more than the top of his chest. She'd only touched him through his trousers. He'd been afraid he'd lose control and go too far if they touched, skin to skin. He'd been afraid to reveal his Dark Mark.

Tonight, absolutely nothing would keep them apart.

"You're really certain?" he asked again, breathless with anticipation.

"Yes."

Together, they closed their eyes and made a wish three times. The door appeared in the wall.

* * *

**To be continued...**

**Thanks for reading - reviews are welcomed.**


	6. Chapter Five

**Chapter Five**

**A true lover considers nothing good except what he thinks will please his beloved. **

* * *

The Room was ingenious. Or perhaps it was the combined strength of their silent requests. The bed, still luxurious with red silk and velvet, sat in the center of the space. Dozens of Persian rugs covered the floor, intricate patterns overlapping like something out of an Arabian fantasy. The ceiling soared and was lit with the golden starlight of a hundred slim candles. A red rose twined around each taper, the heat of the candlelight coaxing the flowers' petals open to perfume the air.

"Good Lord," Hermione said. "This is romantic."

"Thank you." Draco smiled down at her in his arms. "I do make a nice Room."

"_You_ make a nice Room?"

"Now, Granger, no need to be jealous of my prowess. I'll share."

"You'll share your prowess?"

"Yes."

"Well then, carry on," Hermione commanded in a regal voice.

_Yes, Princess_, Draco thought, deciding he liked the sound of the endearment. He obeyed his princess, carrying her to their bed where he placed one knee upon the mattress and unceremoniously tumbled her out of his arms. Tousled and laughing, her hair slipping out of its ribbon and her eyes sparkling - she was the most enchanting sight he'd ever seen. She sat up on her knees, reaching for him, her hands settling on his belt buckle.

"God, no. Stop," Draco said, shaking his head. He placed his hands over hers, holding them firmly as he struggled to regain control. He felt raw, at the mercy of his most primitive urges. All he wanted to do was throw Hermione down, rip off her clothes and fuck her until he came. Her first time couldn't be like that.

"Draco?" The doubt in her voice calmed him. He looked down at her, at the crease of worry between her brows, and smiled.

"Hermione, I want to take care of you. I want to make it good for you. I want to show you how much you mean to me."

"Oh," she said, a look of amazement lighting her face. "I… All right."

"Lie back," he whispered. He removed her hands from his belt.

Draco felt a sweep of affection for Hermione as she looked completely at a loss for a moment. Such a moment was rare, and he savored it. Then she turned and walked on her knees to the middle of the bed and lay back, her head resting on a pile of silky pillows. She smoothed her hands over the hem of her jumper and then held them very still. She was nervous.

"Oh, my wand," she chirped, popping up. She drew her wand a pocket holster and placed it in an empty vase on a bedside table. Draco couldn't remember if the table or vase had been in the room when they'd entered it. He walked around the bed as Hermione settled herself, her hands shaking as she smoothed her jumper again. He placed his wand in the vase, beside hers. They rattled together, sounding like ice in glass.

"What sort of wood is your wand…. I mean…" Hermione stopped, her dark eyes going wide. Her gaze moved to the hard-on pressed against his trousers and then flew up to the ceiling. Draco grinned, even as his arousal soared to painful levels. Hermione's face flushed pink, the blush disappearing down the crisp, white collar of her shirt.

"My wand is hawthorn with a core of unicorn hair," Draco said. He shrugged off his Slytherin robes and scarf, dropping them to the floor, and toed off his shoes. "What's yours?"

"Vine wood," Hermione answered, her eyes never leaving the ceiling. "Dragon heartstring core. Ten and ¾ inches."

"Oh, we're bringing size into this, are we?" Of course, her wand would be longer than his. "Then, I'm ten inches, precisely. Nothing you can't handle, Hermione. You don't have to be scared," he added softly.

"I don't know why I'm nervous," she said. "We've already done so much."

"But we haven't done this."

"No, we haven't done this."

Draco pulled off his jumper, tossing it on top of his robes. He untucked his white shirt and began to unbutton it, from the top button. Midway down, he looked up to find Hermione's eyes on his fingers. He slowed his motions, studying her reaction as he undressed for her. Her pupils dilated, and her mouth fell open. He saw the rise and fall of her breasts as her breath quickened. That he could affect her like this – it filled him with masculine pride. His body was pale. There was nothing he could do about that. A tan would look ridiculous on a Malfoy. And he'd lost weight this year, but he knew he was still fit from years of Quidditch training, with a flat stomach and strong arms. He twisted the last button free. With one cold, fleeting thought for the Mark on his arm, he slipped his shirt off his shoulders.

Hermione took a sharp breath. Draco watched as her eyes moved over his chest and abdomen. He felt chilled, even though the Room was pleasantly warm with candlelight. His nipples were hard.

"Turn around," she said.

Draco smiled and turned away from her, in a leisurely circle, to show off the lean muscles of his back.

"After all these years," she said, "I believe I've finally found a good reason for Quidditch to exist."

"Other than bringing us together?"

"Other than that."

"And being a damn fine sport?"

"Whatever," she said, her voice muffled.

Draco turned around, ready for some lively banter about the merits of Quidditch, but when he saw Hermione, he lost the ability to breathe, much less speak. She'd found a way to conquer her nerves, by bravely matching each of his actions. She'd risen to her knees and just taken off and tossed aside her Gryffindor robes and her jumper. Draco watched, transfixed, as she unbuttoned her shirt with shaking fingers. His hands tightened into fists when he saw the satin gleam of her white bra.

"It's nothing fancy," she said, as she slipped her shirt off her shoulders. Draco saw that her blush had spread down her chest, covering it with a pretty, pink flush. "I didn't expect for this to happen."

"It's perfect. You're beautiful." He waited to see what Hermione would do next, his pulse thrumming in his ears.

She reached behind her to unhook her bra, and her body flexed into a tempting arch, her chest thrust forward. Draco watched as the white fabric slipped off her skin, revealing her small breasts. He'd seen her like this before, in the heat of passion, half in dark. Now, she was on display, for him alone. Her pale curves gleamed in the candlelight. Her pink nipples were as hard as his. Draco fought a flare of arousal. His desires ran wild, just under his skin, making him shiver. A voice inside, fighting for dominance, urged him to _take her hard._ He didn't know how much longer he could go slow.

"Take down your hair," he said.

Hermione arched her body again to take the red ribbon out of her hair, and it was almost Draco's undoing. He bit back a groan as her dark hair tumbled over her bare shoulders. A curl brushed against one of her nipples. As she turned to tie the ribbon to the bedpost, Draco pressed his palm against his clothed erection, trying to find some relief.

This was torment. He needed more. Now. Before Hermione could turn around to watch for his cue again, his fingers were fumbling with the buttons of his trousers.

"Oh," she breathed, her brows lifting in surprise. Draco dropped his trousers to the floor and stepped out of them. He stumbled a little when he impatiently pulled off each sock. He stood up tall, swiping his fringe out of his eyes and hoping Hermione hadn't noticed his clumsiness. Still on her knees, she stared at the hard-on tenting his black boxers. Without realizing it, he was certain, she rubbed her hands down her plaid skirt, stroking her thighs. He saw the muscles of her stomach flex and realized she was leaning forward with a restless movement of her hips.

"Hermione!" he choked. "I can't…" He took a shuddering breath and began again. "Your turn."

"Yes," she whispered, but Draco could see her nerves had returned. His brave, bold Hermione was suddenly shy and awkward, a sight that charmed him completely. She reached for the buttons on the side of her skirt. Then she shook her head and muttered something he couldn't hear. She moved off her knees instead, sitting on the bed and tugging off her shoes. Her toes curled inside her black tights. Draco had dealt with this pesky garment before, on her and on other girls, with a handy Vanishing spell, but Hermione seemed at a loss again. Sometimes, as brilliant as she was, she just forgot she was a witch. With a sigh, she reached under her skirt for the waistband of the hose.

"I'll warn you," she said. "There's nothing sexy about stripping out of these."

"I beg to differ," Draco said, smiling warmly as Hermione shimmied her hips. Her breasts swayed. Embarrassed, she flashed him a glance under her lashes. Something in his amorous gaze startled her. Her fingers slipped, and he heard the hard snap of elastic against her thigh.

"Fuck!" she cried out. "Oh, my God! Fine!"

Giving up all pretense of sensuality or even dignity, Hermione tugged the tights down, revealing the slim curves of her legs. Draco's heart thumped hard in his chest. She slid one foot out of the tights, uncovering shell-pink toenails. As she pulled the other foot free, she lost her balance and toppled back onto the bed. Her skirt flipped up, high on her bare thighs. Draco saw a flash of white cotton knickers, and he was _done_.

He'd wanted to take his time. He'd wanted to seduce her with aching slowness. To begin at the soles of her feet and kiss and nibble and stroke his way up her entire body, taking careful note of every whimper and gasp. He'd wanted to learn exactly what drove her mad with pleasure, but he just couldn't wait.

Before Hermione could right herself, Draco had crawled onto the bed and made her shriek as he dragged her closer by one ankle. He released his hold and leaned down, moving forward with determination, his shoulders trying to nudge her legs apart.

"Draco, no," she said anxiously. She fought him, pressing her knees together tightly.

"Please," he begged, his pride burned up by lust. "Trust me, Princess. Open up for me." He kissed each of her knees and then rested his forehead upon them, waiting and breathless and praying that she would let him. He felt the tentative stroke of her fingers through in his hair and moaned.

"Please," he said again.

"I trust you," Hermione whispered. Draco felt the mattress move as she lay back on the bed. He felt her knees move slightly apart, and elation swept through him. She was tense and trembling but willing, her fingers still caressing one strand of his hair like a talisman. He reached up, took her hand and kissed the inside of her wrist, breathing in a hint of the lotion she put on in the mornings. He knew it wasn't perfume. She'd told him she never wore perfume, something he'd decided he would change one day with an absurdly expensive gift.

Draco moved his lips from the inside of Hermione's wrist to the inside of her knee, then higher. He trailed kisses up the soft skin of her leg until his cheek brushed white cotton. She whimpered, and he closed his eyes, intoxicated by the scent of her arousal. He turned his head and breathed deeply before placing an open-mouthed kiss on the front of her wet knickers. Hermione hissed and bucked up. Draco wrapped his hands around her thighs, holding tight, as he licked the fabric with a strong swipe of his tongue. He could feel the softness of her pussy through it. She moaned and let her legs fall apart as she arched toward his provocative kiss. There was no shyness left in her. She touched him again, her hands stroking the sides of his face and the sharp lines of his cheekbones.

Draco pulled her knickers to one side and looked at her. Dark curls, clinging to the wet, gorgeous strip of her pink pussy. He stroked one finger down the glossy seam of her, and she cried out, calling his name and begging for more. He settled between her legs and licked her with several long strokes, savoring her taste and her passionate reaction, before swirling his tongue around her clit.

"Oh, fuck yes, please _there_!" Hermione sobbed.

Draco was vaguely aware of the storm of sensations whirling around him. Hermione's cries grew frantic. Her belly and thighs trembled under his hands. One of her legs lifted up to embrace him, her muscles flexing and straining as she pressed her foot against the curve of his arse for leverage. Every time his hard cock rubbed against the sheets, he felt a new jolt of agonized pleasure. He wanted to see her, all of her, writhing under him – her head tossed back and her breasts bobbing as she thrust up her hips.

But from the moment he'd tasted her, the focus of Draco's whole world had become his mouth on Hermione. Drunk with the scent and taste of her, barely able to breathe, he teased her clit with steady circles of his tongue. Nothing else mattered. He had to make her come.

He was going to come, too. He tried to stop it, plunging his hand into his boxers and gripping hard around the base of his cock, but it was a lost cause. Hermione began to shudder beneath him. She screamed, her hands rough in his hair. Draco slipped his tongue inside her, desperate to taste her orgasm. Abandoning himself to the intensity of his desire, he thrust uncontrollably into his fist. He came harder than he ever had, spilling onto the sheets with a shout.

* * *

Hermione recovered before Draco, sighing as sensation settled back into her body like a feather floating down. Every inch of her skin tingled. Her mind was bright and alert. She wanted to do this _all the time_. This, among other things.

"Draco," she said briskly.

He didn't answer.

"Draco?"

Hermione propped herself up on elbows and looked down at the man between her legs. His eyes were closed, and he breathed as if he were asleep. His cheek rested against her soaked knickers. The side of his pale hair stuck up at an awkward angle. She jiggled one leg, making his face bounce against the inside of her thigh. He protested with a sleepy grunt.

"Draco, wake up. It's time for you take my virginity."

" 'Mione," Draco slurred. He didn't open his eyes. "I just _came_. Doesn't work that way."

"Why not?"

"It just doesn't for blokes."

"Well, it should," Hermione muttered.

With a frown, she rolled away from him. His face landed in a wet spot on the sheets, but it didn't even faze him. Though supremely satisfied, she felt like a mess. She pulled off her knickers and tossed them to the floor. Then she drew her wand out of the vase on the bedside table and cast a quick _Scourgify_ to clean herself and the wet spot under Draco's cheek. Still amazed at the events of the last hour, she kneeled down beside him and stared.

He was so handsome. She'd always thought so, even when he was an evil, little git. As he'd grown older and taller, the sharp angles of his pale face had become beautifully austere. Now, he looked even more stunning to her. He was good and brave, and he was _hers_. And also it didn't hurt that he was naked except for his black boxers, and those were in danger of sliding off his arse due to the hand he'd shoved down the front of them. Hermione trailed her fingers down the strong muscles of his back, marveling at the smooth warmth of his skin. She traced the groove of his spine, its dip and rise, and only hesitated a second before stroking his arse through his boxers. Draco's pleased moan was muffled in the sheets.

"Honey?" she said. That was what her mum called her dad, and it felt as natural as sunlight on her face.

"Mmmm?" Draco answered.

"Turn over." She pushed lightly against his hip, but he barely budged. She shoved harder and finally resorted to a few firm pokes to his ribs before he rolled onto his back, mumbling about sleeping dragons. As he turned, he pulled his hand out of boxers and lifted his arms up in a lazy, shivering stretch. His body was long and lean, pale against the red sheets, even in the golden candlelight. Hermione barely knew where to look first. She'd never really had the chance to just admire him, and there was so much to admire. The muscles of his chest. His brown nipples. The ridges of his abdomen. His strong thighs.

Her fingers traced the path her eyes had followed, his chest so sleek that she wondered if he removed its hair with a spell. Or was he made this way? When she stroked one of his nipples, Draco moaned. It was a low sound, sleepy and satisfied, and it made her wet again. She turned her gaze to his boxers. They were rumpled, probably sticky and seemed a bit tighter than they had a moment ago. Hermione cleaned them and his right hand with another _Scourgify_ and then laid her wand on a pillow. Draco was still asleep. With both hands, she slowly lifted up the elastic band of his boxers and pulled it down to reveal his…

What was she supposed to call it? Penis just sounded too clinical. A prick? A cock? She'd only ever glimpsed them in the few porn movies and magazines she'd seen. She stared down at _it_, at Draco's cock, fascinated. It was circumcised, half-hard and pink. She hadn't thought it would be so pink. His bollocks were pink, too, and smooth without hair. Definitely a spell. She hoped he didn't mind that she had hair. He hadn't seemed to mind. Hermione blushed at the memory, the intimacy and bliss of his tongue dipping inside her… Good Lord, what was she supposed to call _that_? Her pussy? Her cunt? She wrinkled her nose, finding the last distasteful. She'd never really thought about that part of her body by name before. She only thought of her clit as her clit because she used it several times a week.

Would Draco say those sorts of words? Would they talk without shame about what they wanted? _I certainly hope so_, she thought as she tucked the top of his boxers under his bollocks. There was so much she needed to learn, so much she wanted to do for him. Her curiosity conquered any bashfulness that lingered within her. She touched Draco's hipbone and caressed inward across the lowest part of his stomach, until her fingers were a mere inch from the base of his cock. His skin was so soft there. She moved her fingers in tiny circles to see what would happen. Draco gasped quietly. His cock twitched and grew harder, rising up into the air. Surprised, Hermione gazed up and saw his eyes were still closed. Holding her breath, she gently gripped his cock and stroked him once, slowly up and even more slowly down. It felt so strange - soft to the touch but hard at the core. And hot.

Draco moaned and languidly thrust up his hips. His fingers flexed, digging into the sheets. Hermione stroked him again, captivated, watching his cock become fully erect and almost red in her fist. The slit grew wet. She rubbed her thumb over it.

"Hermione," Draco murmured. "Yes."

She had no idea if he was awake or drifting in a half-dream. She wanted to taste him and feel him inside her mouth. Could she give him the same sort of dazzling pleasure he'd given her? She stroked her hand up his cock one more time until only the head was showing. Then tossing her hair over one shoulder, she leaned down and placed her lips on him. At first, it was just like a kiss, almost innocent. Then she licked him. Encouraged by the arousing sounds he was making, she sucked half his cock into her mouth. She swirled her tongue around him and then tried to take in more. There was no way she'd ever fit the whole thing in her mouth. Hermione realized Draco was awake when his hands plunged into her hair. His breath was ragged, and his thighs trembled with the effort not to pump into her mouth.

"Fuck, Hermione, please. I don't know if I can…" His hands moved to her shoulders. She sensed he was struggling between two warring instincts, wanting to pull her close and push her away. "I may not be able to go again if… if you suck my cock."

_Cock._

The word was perfect, so naughty and gorgeous when Draco said it. Hermione's body flushed with need. She kept one hand on his cock as she sucked it. She'd still only taken in half, and her jaw was already sore. Her other hand moved to one of her breasts. Her fingers plucked at her hard nipple, but it wasn't enough. She slipped her hand down lower, between her legs, and rubbed her wet clit with aggressive strokes. When she moaned, Draco cursed again. His hips snapped up, and his cock pressed deeper into her mouth. Hermione gagged, her eyes watering, and retreated until her lips were just wrapped around the tip of him.

"Sorry. I'm sorry," he apologized as he stroked her hair away from her face. Her mouth slipped off his cock with a final kiss. "You feel so fucking amazing. I couldn't help it. I want you so much."

Hermione looked up to find Draco staring at her, his gray eyes almost black, his expression furious in its intensity. Pleasure swept through her. She was so close to orgasm, all breathless heat and wonder, her fingers still resting on her clit. But she didn't want to come yet, not without Draco inside of her.

"Tell me what you want," she said.

"I want to fuck you. I want to pound my cock into your hot, sweet, tight, little cunt."

_Hot, sweet, tight, little cunt? Oh, God!_

How could she ever find that word – or all its filthy adjectives – distasteful ever again? They sounded delicious on Draco's tongue. As tempting as sin.

"Take off your pants," Hermione ordered.

Draco grinned at her, looking handsome and wicked, with his hard cock pointing up toward the ceiling.

"Hand me my wand, and I'll show you how it's done."

Hermione did as asked and watched Draco Vanish his boxers. She stared at the lean, pale length of his body. The grace of his hipbones, the masculine curve of his arse. She remembered trying to take off her tights without magic, rolling around the bed like an overturned terrapin, and blushed. She realized she might not be good at this, at sex. No book and no amount of research could have prepared her for this moment. She wasn't a temptress. She was just a virgin, and she could very well make a complete fool of herself. Normally, such a prospect would terrify her.

But she didn't care. Draco loved her, and everything would be all right.

With her last shred of reason, Hermione took his wand and cast a Contraception Charm on herself before setting it aside. The skin below her navel tingled.

"I'm glad you thought of that," he said. "All I can think about is how much I want you on top of me."

Draco's voice was pure seduction, low and soft. Hermione straddled him, her heart pounding with excitement. His cock pressed back against his stomach as she slid over it. He wasn't inside her, but they were touching in their most intimate places. Hermione was vividly aware of their nakedness and of the heat radiating between them. Draco made a choked sound and grabbed her hips. His palms were hot, and a beautiful shiver rippled down her spine. He gazed up at her, his eyes worshipful. She wondered how she looked above him, her breasts bare and her hair loose. She certainly liked the view from her position - Draco beneath her, glorious and all _hers_. She felt powerful.

"I'll do my best to make it last for you," he said.

"I'll do my best, too."

"Princess," he said with a tender smile. "You can come whenever you want. As often as you want."

"Then… I'll still do my best," she said, returning his smile.

"You always do."

Unsure how to proceed, except in the most general terms, Hermione rocked her hips. Her wet cunt slid over Draco's cock. He arched up with a cry, his hardness pressing against her. Hermione gasped and, on instinct, pressed back. Her clit rubbed against the blunt, firm head of his cock. At the same moment, their eyes closed and their heads fell back. Their mouths opened in silent, exquisite pleasure. Hermione smelled her own feminine scent. She smelled the candle-warmed roses perfuming the room.

"Do you know how much I've fantasized about this?" Draco whispered, taking her hands in his. "Can you even imagine how much I want to be with you?"

Hermione stared down at their joined hands, and something clicked inside her. A key turning in a hidden lock. Something perfect, something right.

"Yes," she said. "I can imagine."

Still holding Draco's hands, she adjusted her body, spreading her knees wider. His cock slipped an inch inside her. He hissed and clenched his jaw, the grip on her hands becoming almost painful. Hermione had never felt anything like this before, not in her body and not in her heart. Draco stared up at her with agonized longing, his chest heaving. She held his gaze as she sank down onto his cock, joining them together. A pinch of pain forced her eyes shut, but after a moment, it wasn't bad. She just felt stretched and full and strange.

"Does it hurt?" Draco asked, his voice rough.

"No, it's fine."

Hermione opened her eyes and stared down at him. He looked like he was being tortured. His brow was sweating, and the tendons in his neck were etched in sharp relief. Wanting to make it better for him, she rocked her hips again, but she was uncertain of her angle or how to move. It didn't feel bad, but it didn't feel particularly good either. More than anything, it felt awkward. He would have to guide her.

"Draco," she said. "Help me do it right."

"You're doing just f-"

"Shut up and show me."

Draco gazed up at her in shock and then smiled a positively brilliant smile. He'd probably never been told to shut up during sex before. He seemed to like it, she thought with a trembling thrill. It might not be the last time she gave him an order if he kept _talking_ and not _doing_. In fact…

"Go on," she added in a lofty tone.

"Yes, ma'am," Draco replied.

He released her hands and placed his palms on her waist. With gentle pressure, he taught her to move her hips in a grinding motion. It was more subtle than she'd imagined, less eager bouncing up and down. He raised his hips in counterpoint, creating a slide of skin against skin that made him gasp. It still felt strange to Hermione, but she could sense there was more. She felt a hint of it, a lovely unfurling of heat in the core of her body. She gazed down at where they were joined, mesmerized. Draco caressed her hips and arse. His breathing grew labored.

"How does it feel?" he asked.

"Good."

"Good isn't good enough. Lean down a bit." His fingers pressed against the sway of her spine, his touch as light as if he were leading her in a dance.

Hermione leaned closer and felt Draco's cock pop right out of her body.

"Oh!" she cried out. "I'm sorry!" Her face heated with a mortified blush.

"You should be," he scolded. "That's the first time that's ever happened in the history of sex."

It was Hermione's turn to look down at Draco in shock. His eyes were sparkling with mischief. His hands had never stopped stroking her back. He pressed his hips up and smiled as his hard cock nestled between her arse cheeks.

"Oh, shut up!" she said, laughing.

She slapped his arm and felt like a fool and didn't care one bit. She was so happy. With a wiggle, she readjusted her hips until the head of Draco's cock slipped back inside her. Then she sat down, joining them again. This time, they both gasped. The pleasure was intensifying.

Slightly dazed, Hermione asked, "Why is it better if I lean close?"

"Because you can rub your clit against me when you move."

Hermione moaned at the way the word _clit_ sounded when Draco said it.

"What is it?" he asked, concerned.

"I… I like that," she confessed, her blush returning.

"Like what?" After a moment, his brows raised. "You mean when I say _clit_?"

Hermione nodded, too shy to meet his eyes. She stared at his chest, her long hair hiding her face. Draco's hands moved to stroke the tops of her thighs. When he spoke, his voice was slow and soft and wicked.

"Do you like it when I say _cock_?"

"Yes," she admitted with a shiver.

"What about when I say _hot, sweet, tight, little cunt_?"

"Yes!"

Unable to stop herself, Hermione pumped her hips. She leaned forward, hoping to God Draco didn't slip out again, as she rocked over him. She understood the brilliance of his suggestion as her clit slid against his hardness. She cried out at the astonishing sensation and closed her eyes. Her hair fell in a dark curtain all around them. Together, they found a rhythm, grinding against each other with sensual strokes that left her almost sobbing. Draco whispered dirty words in the heated space between them. He described the ways he would fuck her. Hermione wanted to look at him. She wanted to see the passion in his eyes, but for the life of her, she couldn't open her eyes. The rising ecstasy was too great.

Overwhelmed, she rode Draco harder, pressing close. She felt him lifting his body toward her. Her breasts brushed against his chest. One of his hands gripped the nape of her neck through her hair. When she reached out for him, she found his shoulders, sleek with sweat. Her cries grew loud and wanton as Draco's dirty words became sweet words. She came with a shock of incredible pleasure.

Her orgasm seemed never-ending. It shuddered through her body in wave after rapturous wave. She came as she felt the trembling of her cunt around Draco's cock. She came as she heard his uncontrolled cries. And still she came as she floated in absolute bliss, immersed in the scent of roses and sex.

* * *

"Are you going to fall asleep _again_?" Hermione complained three hours later.

"Yes, and so are you."

They lay, twined together, on the red bed. The magical taper candles floated above them, flickering with golden flames.

"But there's still so much I need to learn," Hermione said. She stroked Draco's stomach, fascinated by the shape of the hard muscles under her hand.

"I'm not going anywhere, love," he vowed. "You're stuck with me now. For better or for worse."

"Good," she whispered. "That's good."

Draco leaned down and gave her a long, lingering kiss that made her sigh. Then he rolled onto his back. One arm slung wide, he took his hawthorn wand (unicorn hair core, ten inches) from the vase on the bedside table and pointed it toward the ceiling.

"_Accio Lento Roses._"

In precise synchronization, the stems of a hundred red roses unwrapped from the floating tapers. The fluid grace of their movement reminded Hermione of ballet dancers turning pirouettes. Once untwined, the flowers flew toward the bed slowly and hovered in a loose bundle before her. She touched one. Its petals were velvety soft. She untied her red and gold ribbon from the bedpost and, borrowing Draco's wand, doubled its length. Then she wrapped the silk around the green stems to create a bouquet worthy of Queen Titania.

"Happy Valentine's Day," Draco murmured. His eyes closed as he drifted off to sleep. Hermione set the flowers aside and snuggled against his chest. She smiled as his arms wrapped around her.

"Happy Valentine's Day," she answered, her eyes drifting shut.

* * *

**To be continued...**

**Thank you for reading - reviews are welcomed!**


	7. Chapter Six

**NOTE: There is a jump in time from Chapter Five to Six. You haven't missed any story.**

**Thank you for all the lovely reviews - especially random-stranger. (I would answer you if I could). Let me just say here, Sweet Mother of Mercy, Draco Malfoy loves you, too! And there is much more Helena in this chapter - enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter Six**

**A lover can never have enough of the solaces of his beloved.**

* * *

Draco didn't meet them at the rendezvous point.

That had been almost two days ago, longer than they'd ever made camp anywhere. In the morning, they'd have to leave, unable to delay any longer. The danger of staying was too great. The Snatchers were everywhere.

Hermione lay on their bed in their tent, clutching Draco's pillow. She wondered how long it would smell like him. At first, she'd thrown herself into research, trying to distract herself, but after the first twenty-four hours, she couldn't trick herself any longer.

She refused to take the Dreamless Sleeping Draught, in case they received word and Draco needed her. She thought of the Sleeping Spell he'd once cast on her in the Room of Requirement – vivid dreams lost entirely upon waking. That couldn't be all they were. A year of vivid life - kissing and fighting and laughing and making love – followed by the mournful gray of loss and forgetting.

He couldn't be gone.

But then wasn't that what everyone who lost someone thought, that it couldn't happen, not to _them?_

So much had happened in the last year. Voldemort had been enraged upon learning of Draco's defection and the capture of so many of his Death Eaters. But the Malfoys and Andromeda Tonks were so well-hidden that he couldn't retaliate. For his safety, Draco had been moved out of the Slytherin dorms and into private quarters. Hermione had spent every night in his bed, and he'd eaten his meals with her at the Gryffindor table.

In June, on top of the Astronomy Tower, Harry had witnessed the death of Albus Dumbledore at the hand of Severus Snape. Voldemort had given Draco's mission and the Dark Mark to Pansy Parkinson, but she'd hesitated when the Headmaster had been at her mercy.

"Dumbledore was weak, and she disarmed him," Harry had said. "But it was Snape that did it. Killed him with the _Avada Kedavra_."

Harry had chased Snape, flinging curse after deflected curse, as he and Pansy had run to escape. He'd barely managed to disarm Pansy before an unknown spell from Snape's wand had slashed across his face like an invisible whip, slamming him to the ground.

Snape and Pansy had Disapparated. Dumbledore had lain dead at the base of the Astronomy Tower. And the world had changed forever.

In what would have been their seventh year, Hermione, Draco and Ron had joined Harry on his hunt for Horcruxes. She and Draco had researched the Deathly Hallows. Whenever he embarked on a mission without her, she gave him the ribbon. It was their courtly tradition, the knight and his lady.

"Return this to me," she would say, giving him her favor and a lingering kiss.

_Return to me._

At midnight, forty hours after Draco had gone missing, eight hours before they would have to move on, Hermione fell into a restless sleep. She woke up in his arms and burst into tears. He held her close, whispering reassurances against her skin. He called her his princess. It wasn't enough. She needed the devouring kisses, the desperate clasp, the hard slide of his cock into her body. Reassurance by touch, taste and thrust. Her nails drawing blood, to know that he still lived.

Draco whispered anyway, telling her that he loved her and that he was sorry and that he would always return to her. When the storm inside her calmed, he reached into the pocket of his discarded shirt and gave her the ribbon.

"I'm returning this to you," he said. "As promised."

"Try not to be so late next time."

"Yes, ma'am."

* * *

**No one should be deprived of love without the very best of reasons.**

_My name is Helena Ravenclaw, and I write these words on an historic day. It is Saturday, May 2, 1998, according to their calendar, the day that the Dark One, the Riddle, was defeated by the remarkable one, whose name is Harry James Potter._

_I am certain that much will be written of him and of this day. Hogwarts lays half in ruins, ancient towers blasted into rubble by fiery spells. Many are dead. Some may even linger as ghosts. But the right side has won. And I sense that my journey, or perhaps more accurately, my sojourn is near its end._

_I confess, by my hand, that a thousand years ago, I stole my mother, Rowena Ravenclaw's, diadem. I was jealous of her. I sought to make myself cleverer and more important than her. I fled with the diadem, and my betrayal killed my mother. Upon her deathbed, she sent the Baron to retrieve me. He chased me relentlessly into the forests of Albania, where I hid the diadem in a tree. When I wouldn't return home with him, he became enraged and murdered me. Deeply remorseful, he turned his knife and killed himself. We both returned to Hogwarts as ghosts, and the diadem remained in its hiding place in the forest for centuries._

_One would assume that Time would make me wiser, but it didn't. Some time ago, a young man, who was once handsome and flattering, courted my vanity until I told him my story. He was the Dark One. He found my mother's diadem and transformed it, with the magic most evil, into an abomination. My shame was great. I was the reason that such a great relic was defiled. The young man lived beyond death, with a shattered soul, because of me._

_I was redeemed last night. I told my story, one more time, to Harry Potter, and he proved as true and brave as Godric Gryffindor himself. He destroyed the diadem and freed me from my bonds. Light shines through my grey hands differently now. My being has been altered. I know I can leave Hogwarts now if I wish._

_Is that what I wish?_

_I don't know. All I know is that I want to see my mother._

* * *

Hermione couldn't ask Ron or Ginny or any of the Weasleys. They were broken with mourning for Fred and worry for Lavender's injuries. She couldn't ask Harry. No one deserved a three-day nap more than him. Neville probably deserved a nap as well for standing up to Voldemort and killing Nagini like some sort of dragon slayer out of a Muggle fairy tale. But she'd asked him anyway. She'd mobilized a search party of thirty, comprised of Dumbledore's Army, Order members, professors, house-elves, a handful of neutral Slytherins and Filch. They divided the castle and communicated by Hermione's enchanted Galleons. Hogwarts echoed with Draco's name. After four hours, he still hadn't been found. No one had seen him since Neville had beheaded the snake and all hell had broken loose.

"Break for lunch," Hermione murmured, pointing her wand at the master coin. "Go on, Luna. I'll meet up with you later."

Luna gazed at Hermione with her large, gray eyes. They stood in a corridor on the fifth floor near Ravenclaw Tower.

"If you're looking, Hermione, I'm looking," she said. "That's what friends do. But might I suggest a shower since we're so close the Ravenclaw dorms?"

Hermione looked at the dirt and blood that traced Luna's pale hairline and nodded. "Of course," she said. She probably looked much worse. Her bottom lip was split and bloody, and there were black crescents under all her fingernails.

_This is your first twenty-four hours. This is all you have before you fall apart, before you lay in your bed, longing for him, praying and crying, please let him be alive. Please. Please. Please. Don't give up._

"A shower sounds great," she forced herself to say.

"Lovely," Luna answered, leading the way toward the entrance of the Ravenclaw Common Room. As they turned a corner, Hermione saw Luna tilt her head to one side. "Now, that's strange."

"What?" _Is it him?_

"It's Helena Ravenclaw."

The Grey Lady floated before the portrait of her mother, Rowena Ravenclaw. Hermione had only seen the reclusive ghost a few times. Once, Harry had said he thought she looked haughty, but the same had been said of Hermione, before and after she'd come to Hogwarts. She knew that pride could be used as a shield to hide insecurity and sadness. Draco's wit was never more virulent than when he was nervous. Hermione had sometimes wondered about the Grey Lady's melancholy. What chain of regret bound her to the world of the living? After last night, she suspected it had been the diadem, and now, it was gone.

A painted version of crown glittered on the brow of Rowena Ravenclaw. The austere, black-haired woman in the portrait looked gentler than Hermione had ever seen her look before. She and her daughter spoke in whispers across the thin barrier of paint. Their hands pretended to touch, Helena's sinking into the canvas. They were both crying, the Grey Lady's tears as bright as molten silver.

"We should wait," Luna whispered. "They haven't spoken since they were both alive."

_There's no time for this. He could be buried under stone. He could be suffering from a curse. He could be dying. He could be dead. I have to find him. Please don't be gone, Draco, please. Please._

"Of course," she said.

They waited until Rowena Ravenclaw nodded and placed her hand back into her lap. The Grey Lady turned and saw them. She raised one of her delicate eyebrows and smiled.

"Hello, Luna," she said, her low voice affectionate.

"Hello," Luna answered. She walked forward, and Hermione followed. "This is my friend, Hermione Granger. Hermione, this is Helena Ravenclaw."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Hermione said. She didn't know if she should hold out her hand, so she didn't. The ghost stared at her so intently that Hermione felt a chill run down her arms. After a long, awkward moment, the Grey Lady turned back to Luna and reached out, her luminous hand brushing through the girl's cheek.

"You seem different," Luna said.

"Yes, I changed when Harry Potter destroyed the diadem. My sins are absolved. My mother has forgiven me, and I have forgiven myself. I am leaving and must bid you farewell."

"You're leaving forever?"

"Yes."

"That's wonderful. We're looking for Draco Malfoy," Luna said blithely, as if they were discussing their daily errands.

"Malfoy's missing?" Hermione noticed a sudden alertness in the Grey Lady's voice, and another chill ran through her. _What does she know about Draco?_

"Yes," Luna said. "Have you seen him? He's tall with white-blond hair and pale eyes. Hermione, are his eyes blue?"

"They're gray," she whispered.

"Like mine?"

"Lighter now." Hermione and the Grey Lady spoke at the same time. They stared at each other, Hermione's face stunned and the Grey Lady's impassive. The ghost raised her eyebrow again, a cold and elegant gesture that reminded Hermione of a shrug. _What isn't she telling me?_

"You've seen him," Hermione said. She heard the desperation in her voice and didn't care. "Where is he? I have to find him. He could be hurt."

"I haven't seen Malfoy in months. I can't help you." The ghost began to turn away.

"No, wait. Please!"

On impulse, Hermione reached out for the Grey Lady. Her fingers went through her shoulder, which was as cold as ice water. Hermione took a step back, her hand trembling.

_I can't touch her. At all. She doesn't care. She can't be convinced to help. But surely, a ghost could search the castle quickly. They can pass through walls and stone. Why didn't I think of that before? Oh, God, Hermione, why didn't you ask Sir Nicholas? Where is he?_

"I have to find someone," she said.

"Stop," the Grey Lady commanded. Hermione felt an invisible pressure against her body. It pushed her back against the stone wall. She inhaled, smelling rain and lilacs, as the Grey Lady leaned close to her. When she exhaled, the air was so chilled that her breath was visible.

"I always wondered how your story would end," the ghost said. Her voice had taken on an otherworldly resonance that vibrated inside Hermione's bones. "The lovers on the turret stairs. But I cannot wait any longer."

"Please let me go," Hermione said, but the Grey Lady's didn't release her.

"I do know of another, however. He can help you. He can search where others cannot, and he is… truly relentless. When he arrives, tell him that Helena Ravenclaw asks this task of him."

Hermione was caught by the ghost's piercing gaze. A strange feeling of peace overcame her. She watched, amazed, as the Grey Lady lifted her face up toward the ceiling and began to glow with silvery light. Filaments of white traced the lines of her long hair and robes like shimmering rain. She smiled. Not a melancholy, little smile, but one of true joy, as if she were about to laugh. Her radiance grew so bright that Hermione had to close her eyes.

She felt a rush of wind, wintery cold, and sensed that the corridor had grown darker. Helena Ravenclaw was gone, but she had been replaced by another, more sinister presence. Hermione smelled blood and the fecund rot of a forest floor. She opened her eyes and gasped. The Bloody Baron floated before her, as close as a Dementor seeking a Kiss. His black eyes glared at her from his gaunt face. She could see the glint of silvery blood on his robes, through the loops of the heavy chains draped over his shoulders.

"Why have you summoned me?" he asked, his voice deep and fierce.

Hermione lifted her chin.

"I am Hermione Granger, and I seek a member of your House, my lord. Draco Malfoy. He's been lost since the battle recommenced at dawn."

The Baron's face changed, his expression softening as his severe brow relaxed. He floated back a few inches. "I am, of course, at your service, my lady."

"There's more."

"Yes?"

"I didn't summon you. Helena Ravenclaw asks this task of you."

"Helena!"

The Baron breathed her name with soft, fervent devotion. His face changed again, his black eyes blazing with passion and purpose. Hermione smelled the fragrance of lilacs again. She would have found this fascinating if she weren't sick with worry for Draco.

"Yes, Helena Ravenclaw asks this task of you," she repeated, in case the exact words were important. "Will you help me?"

"I swear I will not rest until Draco Malfoy is found, my lady," the Baron vowed. With another rush of cold wind, he floated back, his chains whipping and rattling around him. He placed his hand on his chest, above where his heart had once beaten, and bowed to her. As he rose, he became a streak of silvery light and flew through the ceiling.

For the first time in hours, Hermione felt real hope. She took a deep breath and sagged back against the wall.

"Well," Luna said. "This has been quite an eventful day, hasn't it?"

* * *

**To be concluded with the next chapter...**

**Thanks for reading - reviews are welcomed!**


	8. Chapter Seven

**The final chapter. :) Enjoy! Thank you, everyone, for reading.**

* * *

**Chapter Seven**

**Every act of a lover ends with the thought of his beloved. **

* * *

Draco had no idea if the battle had ended. If it had, he had no idea which side had won. And he had no idea if he and Pansy would be found, by friend or foe, before they were dead. He repeated his spell to strengthen it.

"_Protego Maxima. Fianto Duri."_

The half-bubble that shielded them from being crushed beneath twenty feet of rubble shimmered with bluish-white light. Draco sat on the floor. Pansy was curled up next to him, his jacket transfigured into a black pillow under her head. He had to bolster the shield's strength every hour, seven times so far. With Pansy stable but still unconscious, how long could he last? A couple of days at best before sleep took him. He'd already decided he would only send his Patronus as a last resort. And didn't know how it would affect the shield, and more importantly, he couldn't risk distracting Hermione in battle.

He _hated_ that he was trapped and helpless, while she was outside facing danger without him. Since he'd joined the Order, his and Hermione's fighting style had become an elegant dance. An ebb and flow of aggression and grace, attack and defense. They protected each other. He would never forgive himself if she… if he hadn't been there to keep her from harm.

_Please let her be all right. Please._

He had prayed more in the last year – short, desperate pleas to any power that would listen - than he had in his entire life. Now he had something more precious than gold and more coveted than power. He had someone he couldn't live without.

Pansy moaned, and Draco looked down at her. Her blue eyes fluttered open, and she gazed at him in confusion.

"Draco?"

"How do you feel?"

"Like shit," she muttered. She gingerly touched her black fringe and found it stiff with dried blood. She was covered with small cuts and bruises. Her Dark Mark was gray under a layer of dust. Her eyes strayed from Draco's face to the rocks above them.

"Are we underground?"

"Essentially."

"That's a wall over us, isn't it?"

"A flight of stairs."

"Bloody fantastic."

With another groan, Pansy stood up and studied the shield. She held up her hand, the top of the bubble just within her reach.

"Don't touch it," Draco snapped. She drew back her hand and scowled down at him. She'd always been curious, ever since they were children, and she'd always touched things to learn about them. He remembered her reaching into the straw in the Manor's stables, when they were five years old, to pull out a reluctant tabby cat that needed petting.

"How long have we been trapped?" she asked.

"Seven hours."

"Seven." Pansy sat down, crossed her legs at the ankle and tilted her head to one side. "I wonder if Potter's won."

Draco felt a pang in his chest as he remembered Harry, limp and dead in Hagrid's arms, his stupid glasses lying crooked on his face. It had taken months for Harry to trust Draco after his defection. But then he had and with the same ferocity with which he did everything else in his life that mattered to him. Not unlike Hermione. The two enemies had become mates. Harry knew about Bellatrix's vicious Occlumency lessons. Draco knew about the cupboard under the stairs.

He'd thought, after Harry's death, that there was no hope left. Voldemort was master of the Elder Wand. The possibilities were terrifying. And then Longbottom had stepped forward.

Why didn't Pansy remember any of this? Draco cast a fleeing glance at her injured forehead.

"Harry's dead," he said.

"No, he isn't."

She seemed so confident that Draco felt a strange thrill of anticipation.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, Potter's still alive. Though I don't know how. I watched the Dark Lord _Avada_ him in the forest. I was ordered to make sure he was dead, but he wasn't. I whispered, _Can you end this?_ And he nodded, just barely. So I said he was dead."

Draco felt a surge of happiness that his friend was alive, swiftly chased by a surge of adrenaline when he realized what that meant. If Harry lived, then he was still the master of the Elder Wand. If… No, _when _he and Voldemort dueled, the wand might not obey the Dark Lord. There was hope. There was a chance, a good chance, according their research. They could have already won.

"That was very brave," Draco said.

"It was very foolish."

He shrugged one shoulder. "Brave and foolish often go together. I've learned that this year, living with a pride of lions."

Draco knew Pansy well. He knew that she tried to adopt a look of contempt for the company he'd been keeping and failed. There was too much worry at the corners of her eyes and mouth. Her lashes swept down, but he could tell – years of knowledge distilled to instinct - that she was struggling to say something that shamed her. He remained silent.

"Why did you do it?" she finally asked.

"Do what?" Draco asked.

"Why did you save me? Why didn't you just stand back and watch me die?" Pansy looked up at him, open and desperate now. The shine of tears made her blue eyes brilliant.

_Because you're in my first memory. Because you're my oldest friend, and I love you._

"Because you're Pansy," he said.

"Draco," she choked as her tears spilled down her cheeks. She hugged her knees to her chest and rested her forehead upon them to hide again as she spoke. "I'm sorry. I was just so angry at you for defecting. You were more than my best friend. I wanted to _be_ with you. Of course, you knew that. But you gave up everything. You turned your back on me and all of your friends for _Hermione_ _Granger_." At this, she glared at him. "I couldn't believe it. The Dark Lord fed my anger and jealousy. I took the Dark Mark without a second's hesitation."

"You defected, too, when you lied to Voldemort. Harry will vouch for you. And if he can't, I will."

"Like it matters." She stared up at the shield and the rocks. "Even if we get out of here, I'll still spend the rest of my life inside a stone cell."

"Pansy, you saved Harry Potter, and he's the only one with any hope of saving us all. That matters."

She sighed and wiped her eyes, still looking heartbroken. Draco realized she probably didn't know about the prophecy. As he leaned forward to tell her about it, the Bloody Baron flowed out of the rocks above. His misty head penetrated the shield. Pansy screamed, and Draco's heartbeat tripped and pounded.

"Two Slytherins!" the Baron shouted triumphantly.

"Baron!" Draco cried out. "Get inside the shield." He had no idea how the ghost would affect its integrity.

"I must tell her where you are," the Baron proclaimed, rising up until he slipped out of the shimmering barrier and disappeared into the rocks again. The shield shivered like ripples in a pond.

More than anything, Draco wanted to ask, "Who?" Who was the Baron reporting their whereabouts to? Was it Hermione? Was she alive? Was she safe?

Instead, he stood up, lifted up his wand and chanted with intense concentration, "_Protego Maxima. Fianto Duri. Protego Maxima. Fianto Duri."_

Blue-white light flowed around him, filling up the bubble of protection like water. Despite his spells, the shield began to weaken, its glow cracked by a slow shattering. The veins of darkness were as thin and delicate as spider silk, but they were growing.

Pansy stood up, raised her wand and chanted with him.

"_Protego Maxima. Fianto Duri."_

* * *

Draco heard voices screaming and chains rattling. He heard a sharp, violent sound like the winter ice on the Black Lake cracking in March. Rocks fell, and a bright light flashed. He threw his body over Pansy's just as pain pierced his shoulder. Agony burned down his arm, but before it reached his fingertips, he was in a dark place where feeling no longer existed.

And then he was gone.

* * *

When his senses returned, they returned with a vengeance. Draco ached all over, hot pain radiating from his shoulder. He opened his eyes and saw stone vaults, their misty tops disappearing into a starry sky. The Great Hall stood, its enchantments still in place. He lay on a bare mattress on the floor. Glancing to the left, he saw bandages spotted with brick-red blood covering his shoulder. He saw Pansy on the next mattress, a bandage around her head. Her eyes were closed, and she was breathing softly. Beyond her was an entire row of injured fighters. His allies.

Death Eaters gave no quarter. Did that mean Harry had won? Or was this only a pause in the battle? He gazed up at the stars, listening for hints, and heard Slughorn's voice across the hall.

"Just dropped his ghostly chains and disappeared as soon as Miss Granger levitated Malfoy out of the rubble. I don't know what debt kept him trapped here for a millennium, but whatever it was, he's moved on, just like the Grey Lady. Most unusual. Won't say I'll miss him though. Ghastly fellow. All that blood."

"Hermione," Draco whispered.

"She's alive."

Draco's eyes snapped back to Pansy. She was awake and staring at him.

"Granger was at your side for hours," she said. "She just left twenty minutes ago to check on Potter in Gryffindor Tower."

"We won?"

"_We_?" Pansy smirked as she held up her arm to display the black skull and serpent marking her white skin.

"Whatever," Draco said. He tried to lift his marked arm, too, wincing as pain lanced his shoulder.

After a long silence, Pansy said, "They fought at dawn, just the two of them. Voldemort's Killing Curse rebounded and ended him as Potter disarmed him. Damned _Expelliarmus_. You could have told me I was the master of the fucking Elder Wand for five minutes, Draco."

"Wouldn't want all that power to go to your head," he joked. But at the same time, he was thinking, _It's over. It's finally really over._

He sat up despite his pain and a swirl of dizziness. He had to find Hermione. He had to see her as close to now as possible. If the Great Hall still had an enchanted ceiling, it was likely that Hogwarts' Anti-Apparition wards were in place. Didn't matter. He was too weak to Apparate anyway without risking a good splinching. There wasn't a broom in sight, and even if there was, he'd probably just fall off it, snap his neck and become the laughingstock of the war dead.

Unbidden, he remembered their first Valentine's Day – the surprising and beautiful sight of Hermione on a broom, flying toward him, her hair whipping in the wind. How she had given her innocence to him, how she had _taken_ him so passionately. His smile must have been daft because Pansy snorted with disgust.

"Fucking Hufflepuff," she scoffed. "Have fun walking up seven flights of stairs."

* * *

Weary and aching, Draco entered the archway of the turret stairs on the sixth floor. Five steps up, as the turret began to coil, he realized something was wrong. It was too windy and too bright. After five more steps, the outer wall became the vast blue sky. The stairs continued to twine up, clinging to the center pillar like vertebrae. The turret, _their_ turret, was a ruin, blasted away by spells that had left a dark burn down the side of Gryffindor Tower. Its stairs led nowhere now, halfway to heaven before crumbling away.

Hermione sat on what Draco knew to be the highest, safe stair. She would have tested it with at least three spells before sitting down and leaning back against the pillar to gaze out over the western mountains. He stared at her, unseen.

She'd taken a shower. Her hair was loose and still damp, darker than usual and curling up at the ends. Her bottom lip and forehead had cuts on them. A bandage wound around her left wrist. She wore a white shirt, jeans and the black flats he secretly liked because they made him that much taller than her.

Feelings of wonder and gratitude overwhelmed him as he stared at her profile against the blue sky. He loved every part of her – her long lashes and pert nose, the delicate curve of her chin into her long neck. But some parts he loved best. Like her right hand, which rested on her knee. That hand had touched his sleeve one November day and sent his heart racing. Or her dark eyes, which gazed at the mountains. Those eyes had looked into his soul and seen the man he could become. The man he hoped he had become.

Draco didn't know which was the greater miracle – that they'd found each other in the dark or that they'd both lived through the darkness. He leaned against the pillar, and Hermione turned her head and saw him.

Or perhaps the greatest miracle was that she looked at him in the same, enraptured way he looked at her, with wonder and gratitude shining in the eyes he loved so much.

"Just tell me one thing," he said.

"Anything," Hermione said.

"Please tell me Harry didn't really use _Expelliarmus_ to defeat Voldemort."

She smiled brightly, and Draco felt dizzy.

"He did," she said.

Draco rolled his eyes. "Bloody Gryffindors get all the glory casting first year spells and hacking up reptiles with swords while we Slytherins have to huddle under rocks." _Like the reptiles we are._

"Snape was a Slytherin. And Pansy deserves a bit of glory, too. Or at least leniency."

"I heard."

"And you _did_ get to destroy a Horcrux, Draco, so stop your whinging."

"It was only a little one. Not a giant snake. Longbottom's going to get all the girls now."

"You're not allowed to get all the girls anyway," Hermione said with mock sharpness. She stood up and stared down at him. With the blue sky behind her, in her white shirt, which Draco realized was _his_ white shirt, he allowed himself the fantasy of thinking that she looked like a noble and war-weary angel.

"You're also not allowed to be out of bed," his bossy angel continued. "Why aren't you resting?"

"I couldn't. I had a job to do."

"What job?"

Draco walked up the turret stairs, every step painful. His shoulder throbbed, and his head ached. Though his hair and skin had been _Scourgified_ of grit, he needed a long, hot bath. He still wore the clothes he'd worn in battle. They were streaked with blood and dirt and smelled of soot. He reached into the pocket of his ruined shirt and pulled out Hermione's favor. The ribbon was as lustrous as the day she'd given it to him, on these stairs, the charmed silk shifting from red to gold. He held it up to her.

"I had to return this to you," he said. "As promised."

Hermione stared at the ribbon for a long moment before reaching out and taking it, her fingers lightly brushing his. She lifted the silk to her lips and held it there. A breeze swept around the broken turret and through her wet hair, making her shiver. She wore the perfume he'd given her. Draco gazed at the dark fan of Hermione's lashes against her cheeks and wondered what she was thinking until he saw tears brimming at the corners of her eyes. Then he knew she was thinking about all the things that could have torn them apart forever but hadn't. He reached up and placed one hand softly on her waist. She sniffed and then walked down two steps, her eyes still downcast, until their lips were inches apart and he was embracing her. He felt the ribbon's red heat between them as she placed her hands on his chest.

"I told you not to be so late again," she finally said, gazing up at him with bright eyes.

"Yes, ma'am," he whispered as he leaned closer. "Tell me how I can make it up to you. I'll do anything."

Hermione smiled, seeming to consider the erotic possibilities of _anything_. Then Draco kissed her, and she didn't answer him for an hour. By the time she whispered her desires in his ear, her hair had dried, and the sun had set. The sky was soft with lilac light, and the distant mountains, as misty as clouds.

"Yes," Draco answered. He would do anything for her. She had saved him, after all.

Holding hands, they walked down the turret stairs together.

**THE END**

* * *

**End Notes:**

Any "Draco Defects" story greatly alters canon. Although I tried to include detail in this story to explain those changes, I wanted to let readers know I had thought it out. In my imagination, after Draco defects, Voldemort assigns Pansy his task. The Death Eaters never enter Hogwarts via the Vanishing Cabinet, but Pansy does disarm Dumbledore in the Astronomy Tower after he was weakened in the cave by the sea. She can't bring herself to kill him, however, and Snape kills Dumbledore, which fulfills his promise to his mentor and his Unbreakable Vow to Narcissa. As Snape and Pansy escape, Harry gives chase, disarming Pansy, and thus, winning the allegiance of the Elder Wand. At this point, I will say "unspecified things" happen as Draco joins the Horcrux hunt. At some point, the Death Eaters captured during Draco's defection escape and rejoin Voldemort (so that they can DIE in the final battle). During the Battle of Hogwarts, Snape is killed by Voldemort, his memories are given to Harry, and therefore, Harry learns he must sacrifice his life. Pansy, regretful of her choices, falsely confirms Harry's death in the Forbidden Forest. Harry, as master of the Elder Wand, defeats Voldemort. Pansy is granted leniency. The Malfoys are reunited. Lucius' pimp cane, the source of all his power and corruption, is snapped in half so that he won't misbehave in the future. Just kidding. A Lucius without a pimp cane is like a peacock without any feathers – just sad.

* * *

**Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed "For Her Favor" - reviews are welcomed!**

**Love, Captainraychill**


End file.
